[Chris Hibner]

Here are a few things:

Team numbers used to change every year, and team numbers were assigned in alphabetical order of the main sponser. In 1999, FIRST decided to stop renumbering teams every year, thus the 1998 numbers were locked into place as long as the team stays intact. Because of the numbering by alphabetical order of sponsor, you see all of the Delphi teams (45, 47, 48) GM teams (65, 66, 67, 68), Motorola teams (108,109,111), UTC teams (175, 176, 177, 179, 180) all grouped together. Team 1 (the Juggernauts) aren't number 1 because they were the first team ever in first, it's just that their sponsor came first alphabetically in 1998. Who was their sponsor? Answer: 3-D Services.

The first year of the optional bumper was 2000. However, there were no rules on what the bumper could be made from. The only team I remember taking advantage of the bumper rule was 47 (ChiefDelphi) which made bumpers from carbon fiber or fiber glass over a metal frame.

Here's a fun one: prior to 2000, the game was played on a field that was roughly half of the current field size. They used to put two fields side-by-side so they could reset one of the fields while the match was being played on the other field. In 2000, they switched to the current field size, but all drivers were at the same end. They would alternate which end had the drivers. That way, driver station could be reset while the previous match was occurring. The first year of having the opposing alliance drivers on opposite ends of the field was 2002.

Prior to 2002, each drive team had two coaches in the driver station.