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Jnadke:
Placement doesn't always represent robot or team quality. Perfect example is my team this year. At regionals, we had a few poor alliances but our good ones were great. We ended up placing 15th at GLR, and were not picked. We qualified for nationals on Leadership in Control. Every match there had some kind of problem. All but one match (when we were intentionally flipped and our breaker box came loose when we self-righted) we were on top of the hill. We shoved our way to the top against some of the toughest competitors, while our alliances jumped off the top at the last second.
We lost most matches by under 25 points, I think only one loss was more than 25. We ended up placing 48th I think and again were not picked. We were a powerhouse of torque and traction but never saw an elimination match.
Maybe it was not selling ourselves enough, who knows.
As for the overcoming static friction, that is a great feat with such a large amount of weight. Not every robot could pull the truck and trailer, especially on an obscure surface that the bot wasn't designed for. I'm glad we never had a pushing match with 93, don't know whom would have won.
Being picked for an alliance isn't the most important thing in FIRST though, I really realized that this year. (Last year, at all 3 regionals my old team was in elims, twice picked, once picking). I learned a lot this year and had a great time in the 15 matches I was operator for.
I made a lot of sacrifices for what on the outside looks like little reward this year. To Tyler, and other non-elimination round teams/people: I hope you enjoyed the competition and aren't truly sad that you did not compete in eliminations. FIRST has a lot to offer if you want it. Don't just focus on the competition itself, thats one of the smallest peices of the FIRST puzzle
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