[PayneTrain]

Planning for a second regional? Great! Do you have the money? That is important.

I have no indication of your operating budget size but realize that you probably want a good $2500 or more on top of paying for your registration fee.

Be acutely aware of strategizing how you register for regionals. You have picked two regionals in what I think is the most ideal configuration for a competition season of a regional team. A Week 2 event gives you time for FIRST and Week 1 teams to iron out the bugs while still giving you some experience other teams won't have for your second event. Getting two weekends of time between competitions allows you just enough time to evaluate your performance at the first event, propose changes to your robot, and execute them.

While the regionals you have chosen fit well, be aware that Pittsburgh will almost definitely fill this week, while Buckeye will have half a dozen spots available after the initial wave of second event registration. Make sure the two contacts you have passed screening for YPP on TIMS. At 11:45 on Thursday, have them log into TIMS and get ready to ride out the annual fastest finger competition when registration opens at noon. If you don't register for Pittsburgh as soon as you can, you'll miss it. It's a small event on a premium week (There are 5 regionals that weekend in a season with 57 regionals over 6 weeks. At an average of 95 regionals a week, that's...significant).

However since I'm telling you to gamble on your home regional's availability in October, make sure you watch the regional's registration status. If it gets close, talk to your RD and/or pull your GPR registration for Buckeye.