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Posted on the FRC Blog, 12/5/14: http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprogr...idays-12052014

Frank Answers Fridays: December 5, 2014

Blog Date: Friday, December 5, 2014 - 09:19

Today’s good question comes from Chris Picone, from FRC Team 2791, Shaker Robotics, from Latham, New York, USA:

Question:

Hi Frank,

I'm Chris Picone, currently a mentor for FIRST FRC Team 2791, Shaker Robotics, from Latham, NY. My question today is about when practice matches are scheduled at regional events.

The scheduling of events on Practice Day at regionals has always bothered me. Using the Finger Lakes Regional agenda as an example, Practice Day runs from 8:30 AM to 8:00 PM. Practice matches are scheduled from 10 AM to 4:30 PM with an hour break for lunch, allowing teams 5.5 hours to play these matches. Teams then have from 4:30 PM until 8 to do whatever they need.

I believe this current system has a lot of problems. First, the practice matches before noon are extremely under-utilized. Even for teams whom are finished with their robot, the process of setting up a pit, testing everything, and getting pre-inspected often takes a while. Expecting teams to make a match beginning just 90 minutes after they first have access to their robot is quite a high bar. As a result, the practice matches from 10-12 barely even happen, and when they do there are never more than two robots on the field.

After lunch, the situation is usually a little bit better. However, inspectors rightfully encourage teams to get fully inspected as soon as they can. This is something my team has done and we have missed practice matches to meet this goal before. Even with a complete or nearly complete robot, by getting inspected early we have trouble making more than a single scheduled practice match in a day.

Once matches are over, teams that are "done" and inspected can do essentially nothing. The practice field is usually already fully booked at this point, and since robot operation in the pits is quite limited, all of the extra time of practice day just goes to waste. The only teams who benefit from this time are teams who are not done finishing their robots, and these teams would miss their practice matches no matter when they were scheduled.

I believe if we changed the current system to have practice matches from 12:30 PM to 6 PM, with the possible addition of an inspection requirement, practice day would be better for everyone. Inspectors would be happy as teams no longer have an incentive to push inspections off. Teams with finished or mostly finished robots would have four hours to get their pits and robots in order before they have to practice. Teams without finished robots would actually have a chance of testing their robot if they work quickly enough. All teams would enjoy the benefits of a practice match with more partners and opponents to play with. Volunteers would be needed for the same amount of time as they would be with the old schedule (5.5 hours), so their commitment would not grow. Finally, there would be far less "wasted time" at the end of the day where teams are done but can't do anything since the practice field is closed. To me, it seems like a win-win situation for all parties involved.

I guess this is less of a question and more of a suggestion - my apologies for that. If there are other factors in play influencing the practice match schedule, or if there are good reasons why this idea isn't feasible, I'd love to hear about them. I know setting up something as complex and large scale as a FIRST competition is never easy, and perhaps there are factors in play not obvious to participants that make things work this way. All that said, I believe a change like this would greatly increase team competitiveness, improve the quality of matches, and help prevent the end-of-day "inspection rush".

Thank you for your time and consideration

Answer:

Hi Chris. Great suggestion. Consider it done.

We’ve actually had a team of staffers, volunteers, and event management professionals looking at this issue since September. The team was led by Collin Fultz, FRC Team Advocate. Just this week we got mostly positive feedback on the plan from the Regional Directors, which was the last element we were looking for before moving forward.

We recognized this as a problem. I’ve been to many Regionals at which the greatest place and time to take a nap was on the field at 10AM on Thursday, when practice matches were supposed to be starting but teams weren’t ready. Not the teams’ fault – there’s just much to do that first morning at a Regional. Scheduling practice matches well before most teams are ready is a waste of resources, as you point out.

You may wonder why we needed a cross-functional team to look at this, rather than the FRC staff just saying ‘go’. As you speculated, when we start shifting schedules around, we experience a cascade effect. Volunteers need to work different or longer hours, meal needs may change, and some other planned activities may need to be moved. Event schedules are a network of gears – hard to shift one without affecting the others in some way.

But, the good news is we’re making this change for the 2015 season. At Regional events, practice rounds will run without planned interruption from 12:00PM to 6:30PM. (Hey, that’s an hour longer than you asked for! Sweet.) The lunch break will be scheduled before this time. The plan is to have scheduled practice rounds until 5:30PM, and open field practice from 5:30 to 6:30. During scheduled rounds, as in the past, teams are assigned specific practice slots and may practice during those times even if they have not passed inspection. A filler line will continue to be available during that time, only for teams that have fully passed inspection. The hour of open field practice at the end of the day is only for teams that have fully passed inspection. Here’s the message: please focus on passing inspection, so you can maximize your practice time!

There may be some minor variation in this schedule between events, but this will be the standard schedule.

Frank

Frank Answers Fridays is a weekly-ish blog feature where I’ll be answering ‘good questions’ from the FRC community. You can e-mail your questions to goodfrcquestion@usfirst.org. Please include your name, team number and where you’re from, which will be shared, if selected.