[Jake177]

My first competition was the UTC New England Regional in 2001. At the closing ceremony on Friday, my team (177) was announced as the winners of the GM Industrial Design Award. I can remember being so excited to go up on stage and shake hands with both Dean and Woodie (Dean came Friday and Saturday and Woodie was the field announcer). On Saturday, we finished somewhere around 9th in the seeding rounds and was picked in the first round of alliance selection by the 3rd place team (team 126), and ended up winning the regional (along with teams 69, 175 and 501). After the closing ceremonies, Dean was just hanging out on the stage talking to students and a few reporters, most of them asking about Ginger/It. I remember one student in particular telling him "I can keep a secret" to which Dean replied "So can I".
I can remember feeling kind of disappointed the next year when neither Dean or Woodie came, but I guess they can't be everywhere at once...yet.