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Email from Don Bossi:

Dear FIRST® Community,

Since we announced the expansion of the FIRST® Championship to two events almost two years ago, we’ve heard a lot of questions, concerns, and excitement about our plans. While FIRST is not about winning or losing, we have heard a number of requests for the Winning Alliances from each Championship to meet and compete against each other, and we promised to explore options for that to occur.

Today, FIRST is excited to announce that on July 28 & 29, 2017, we will host the Festival of Champions near our home town of Manchester, New Hampshire – where the inaugural FIRST competition was held 25 years ago in 1992. This event, which will be live streamed to the FIRST community, is an opportunity for the FIRST® Robotics Competition (FRC) and FIRST® Tech Challenge (FTC) Winning Alliances from the 2017 FIRST Championship Houston and FIRST Championship St. Louis to meet live and in person, along with the FRC Chairman’s Award and FTC Inspire Award winning teams from both Championship locations.

The Festival of Champions is designed to be an experiential reward for the world-class teams that rise to this level. It will include robots, education, camaraderie, and once-in-a-lifetime opportunities, such as behind-the-scenes tours of FIRST Headquarters and Dean Kamen’s company, DEKA Research & Development, as well as a celebratory dinner at Dean’s amazing home. For those that have never been, Dean’s home is an ‘experience’ all its own and is absolutely unforgettable.

The FRC and FTC Winning Alliances from both Championship events will meet in competition on Saturday, July 29. Chairman’s and Inspire winning teams from both Championships will not be competing with their robots, but they will have important roles and places of honor during the playoff event. As noted above, this event will be webcast to reach as much of the community as possible, and the competition will be free and open to as many in-person spectators as we can safely accommodate. We will work hard to make the webcast a robust and highly viewable event. Unlike other official FIRST events, however, there will be no registration fees for those teams earning the right to participate in person.

We’re very excited to host this 2017 concluding event in New Hampshire and to welcome the teams who earn the honor to attend our Festival of Champions. We’re sure you have questions about the details for this special event, including how exactly the competitions will be run. We’re still working out all those details, so stay tuned!

We look forward to the large-scale and exciting FIRST Championships in Houston and St. Louis this coming April, followed by a wonderful Festival of Champions in July.

Good luck to all, and Go Teams!

Bob Tuttle
Co-Chair FIRST Board of Directors

Kelly Ortberg
Co-Chair FIRST Board of Directors

Dean Kamen
Founder, FIRST

Don Bossi
President, FIRST