Being our first nationals .. I dont have much to base this on. There were some things that stood out -
- Awful video and sound in the pits and in the dome. Whoever put up the LCDs and screens, must of not realized the light between the two. The entire screen was washed out. There was countless times in the pits where feedback killed your ears. Also, the Einstin field's sound during the FLL, outperformed most of the matches in the dome.
- That walk, sucked. Thankfully (well .. kinda) our team captain lost his voice, and asked me to take over. He regained it on Saturday afternoon, but by then, I had a "Team Support" sticker for the finals. Our team timed the walk from the pits to the Curie field, something like 8 minutes I believe.
- The food. It wasnt bad, but the prices were past ridiculious. Aside from the fact they jacked up the prices on the second day, $4 for a 32oz coke that was 3/4 full of ice .. that was just lame. And $3 for a bottle of water that is found in most coke machines for $1.
- Security. This might be going back to the walk thing, but those people were everywhere .. and god forbid you needed something in your pits. Walk briskly .. and get yelled at. I know running might be a safety hazard, but if you need something .. they should be somewhat understanding.
- Entering and Exiting the dome. Right after the alliances got picked, the teams ran back to the pits. Well, tried to at least. The line at the door, only because they wanted people to go thru those little counter thingies, filled up most of that area under the second floor inside the area. Same thing with all the esclators.
- Poorly trained refs. I know you cant argue with them, but we had numerous flags thrown on us, for entering the ball chute (which .. from my view on the floor 5 feet away, we didnt) They heard our bot hit that aluminum "L", jumped over as the bot was driving away, and threw a flag. They should of had a ref at each box, watching only the chute, or some sort of camera system. There was also alot of restarts, because the balls didnt drop in auton (if the 10pt was hit) or even at the 45 sec.
Geez .. I think this is the longest post in here
