Quote:
Originally Posted by George Nishimura
8 teams, potentially from very different parts of the world, are going to travel all the way to New Hampshire/Detroit/wherever, to potentially play two (at most three) 2.5 minute matches?
2 of the teams may never play either.
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It would be better to have the division winners from both events attend. Then they could hold it as a 1-day event like the MN State Tournament - quals in the morning until about 1, then alliance selections, a break for lunch, and elims. You would have 32 teams there, and the eventual winning alliance may have teams from both events on it, which I think would be rather cool. It could also easily fit into a single weekend, not requiring much, if any, time off work or School for people. Of course, the problem with this is still travel costs... Having a team from China, Brazil, or Israel (for example) have to return to the US for yet another event could be prohibitive. Even closer team's may find the cost to be too much, traveling from Michigan, Texas, California, etc to Manchester or whatever the event would be held.
For something like this to work, I think FIRST would have to pick up a significant portion of the tab. No registration fee, secure hotel and flight accommodations for a certain number from each team (10? 4 drive team members, plus 4 pit students and 2 mentor/chaperones). Without doing something like that, I can easily see teams deciding to skip the event and call it a year.