[Kevin Kolodziej]

Of the nine championship events I've been to now, I truly believe this was the worst run one of them all. Thats not to say that there weren't tons of good things going on, but there were quite a few things that bothered me greatly:

1. Team Forums. Nice to see that FIRST made an effort to listen, but did they really expect anything when they schedule the forums during uncrating and the driver's meetings?? I don't know if the Thursday session was better, but the Wednesday session was very poorly attended. The message was certainly clear though.

2. The complete LACK of fanfare. This is the CHAMPIONSHIP EVENT! I can understand not having the ballons because they blocked the upper deck, but there should be SOMETHING that makes this event feel like something special. Maybe there were things cut out because we were running late - no top 10 list? ??

3. Woodie Flowers Ceremony. Shouldn't the things Dan did (Congrats by the way!!) have been read before he was announced as the winner? At first, I was very upset that simply his name was announced and thats it. What happened to the list of finalists that used to be displayed? Perhaps the WFFA winners could be asked to stand and be recognized. It just seems to me that this award is being given less attention than it deserves. I completely agree with the other comments about there needing to be bios or essays of the winners in the HOF.

4. Pits. You can't hear the announcements down there at all. Setup seemed okay to me though, and practice fields were well managed.

5. Scheduling. I know we're saying goodbye to the Algorithim of Death, so hopefully I'll never have to complain about seeing several of the same teams multiple times again. However...I hope the new algorithim is better at spacing as well. There was a team in Curie that was in match 81 and 85 - HOW DOES THAT HAPPEN WITH 86 TEAMS??? Finally, why did we not get a match schedule in the pits until 8:30 on Friday...after the first match was supposed to bed queued? Its not as if the schedule wasn't generated...Archimedes was displayed on the pit screens for nearly an hour before everyone else saw thier schedules..

6. Judging. I feel sorry for the teams that only saw one judge for a few minutes. At least you saw one judge. Team 1675 had a group of judges stop at the pit, give us a sticker to put on our sign without saying anything related to judging, and said they'd be back shortly. They never returned. Unforgiveable. We paid the same entry fee as everyone else and expected the same opportunities to tell our stories and show our stuff as everyone else.

7. Wrap Party. I applaud the effort to move the whole thing indoors. It went well and the performances we did see were pretty neat. However, my kids were really looking forward to seeing DSK, and were very sad to find out they had left the stage before we even left our seats in the dome. We were also under the impression (perhaps falsely...not sure where the rumor came from) that there would be a laser show at the end in place of the fireworks..but no such show occured. FIRST should also be aware that people were turned away from the games without warning at 9:45 after standing in line for quite some time. The staff should have closed the lines at 9:30 and given everyone in line their turn...not abruptly close the game before the event is supposed to end.

8. Bring back Thursday night qualifying and/or reduce the number of teams. Lets do some math. Next year there are 41 regionals. Assuming the same format next year, 6 teams per regional qualify. Thats 246 teams. Then we have the six remaining legacy teams. Thats 252. We now have 14 HOF teams other than legacy teams. That brings us to 266. Add two for the winners (190 already is on the list as a legacy team) and we have 268. Assume the same stats, adjusted for next year, with 45 regionals, and for the 2009 Championship we're at 294ish. Obviously there are going to be some teams that qualify multiple times, so the actual number will drop. Assuming worst case though, we're looking at 67 in 2008 and 72 in 2009 for teams in divisions, without open registration. That works for me...maybe you'd get 8 or 9 matches. Otherwise, play a round or two on Thursday night. If this event is supposed to determine an overall game champion (amongst other things), The best teams need to have a chance to rise to the top. Luck can never be eliminated, but it can be reduced.