[JamesCH95]

I come from a veteran team, team #95, but we are in the "have not" category. Right now we are $100 in debt and have no $ to buy materials for our robot. We have never had a practice robot ever, yet most years we are incredibly competitive. The biggest thing that makes a team competitive is how well the team functions as a unit. Since we have an all-student pit crew and drive team, and virtually only students build the robot, we can diagnose any problem almost instantly on the field and we know the limits of our machine. But of course the second most important thing to being competitive is having a driver and operator with good skills that work well together and a drive coach that knows how to use them. I believe that any team can sport these few traits and can therefore be very competitive. Having huge resources to draw upon does make life much easier for the well-sponsored teams, but it makes me feel good to win matches when everything is stacked against us.