[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by PayneTrain

This is very true and can be evidenced by certain states. Ones that have taken advantage of the FTC competition structure to improve team quality have seen improvements in merit qualifications to world champs. Meanwhile, those same states that stay in the regional systems send a lower percentage of FRC teams to worlds.

The difference in qualifications to Champs is that regionals get a specific number of teams per regional, while districts get a % of spots at Champs. The result is that district areas have a pretty equivalent ratio representation at champs, while some regional areas are worse. It's not a question of competitiveness. From what I saw posted on here, the new Iowa regional was highly competitive, with high scores, higher % of breaches and captures... but they still only sent the same number of teams as every other regional.