[JB987]

"It's silly to think we would pace ourselves, because I know there are teams that aren't. This is a competition. If you're not in it to give the absolute best effort you can, why even bother? If the rules let you work 7 days a week for 10 weeks, I'll be working 7 days a week for 10 weeks, and it will be everything else that suffers as a result, not the FRC team. "

So, because someone is unable/unwilling to set a work schedule that decreases their chance of burnout, we should limit every other team's options? As you may have surmised, my team is in it to give the best effort that we can (which is why we adopted a reduced work schedule to maintain our sanity and productivity) and we don't work 7 days a week for 6.5 weeks anymore (see my earlier post)...and we seem to be able to maintain a high degree of competitiveness. It's not the total number of hours worked that determines a program's success, it is the quality of the time spent. For me, working no more (and maybe even less) hours but spreading the hours/days out more would serve to reduce stress and allow for a better balance of personal-competitive life.