[MrTechCenter]

We got into Championships off of the waitlist and found out the Wednesday before the week of Championships. We're from California so we had to have our robot shipped THE VERY NEXT DAY after we accepted our invitation. We built a crate in less than 4 hours and it was in St. Louis the Friday before Championships (it arrived 14 hours after it left us). We knew we were high up on the waitlist, so we booked hotel rooms ahead of time at a hotel that had a 100% cancellation policy (we ended up booking another hotel after we got in because we found a nicer and cheaper one). Flights, however, we're not as great. You can't cancel flights unless you pay a lot more up front, you can only get airline credit for a year if you cancel which would not have helped us if we booked earlier and didn't get in and had to cancel. The result instead was our team having to drive two hours to San Francisco for a flight that left at 6am. And half of our team had to go on a separate flight on a different airline. And it was the same split-situation on the way back. Also, we had to leave from here a day later and leave from St. Louis a day later than we wanted because flights were totally booked for the days we wanted.

A simple solution for the Championship waitlist (especially with the increased capacity in 2015): If FIRST really gives out waitlist slots based on who signed up first, just tell teams ahead of time where they are on the waitlist so that teams that are higher up can make arrangements beforehand instead of scrambling at the last minute.