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Unread 16-04-2007, 23:46
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VEX Robotics Engineer
AKA: Arthur Dutra IV; NERD #18
FRC #0148 (Robowranglers)
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Re: Championship 2007 - Atlanta - What Needs To Be Improved

Quote:
Originally Posted by dsmoker View Post
Let me start off by saying that this was our team's first trip to Atlanta (we never qualified before and barely raised the money once we did). On the whole it was an excellent experience, with a few minor drawbacks:

1. We were initially told there would be a shuttle from our hotel to the convention center. There was not. It was about a 20 min. walk, which seemed a lot longer at the end of a long day.
Where was your hotel? I'm sure if it was near one of the MARTA stations downtown that could have saved you a bunch of walking. (The train trip would probably still take about 20 minutes, but at least you'd be sitting on a train instead of walking after a long day.)

Quote:
Originally Posted by dsmoker View Post
3. There was no where in the pit area to sit down. At the UTC Regional, which we attend each year, there are tables and chairs to the side of the pit area so teams can sit and even eat during strategy sessions once alliances are formed. Our drive team never got to eat before the quarterfinals, and if we had won wouldn't have gotten to eat for quite some time, as no food could be brought into the pits. Knowing this, should we qualify again (and have enough money) I would plan to do what I saw some teams do, that is design toolboxes to double as seating areas for the pit crew.
In the pits (Building C of the GWCC), there were TONS of seats in the lobby outside the pit floor space. If you went up to the second level, there were even more couches, chairs, and even a [rather high priced] food court with pretty decent food, which is much better than the food in the GA Dome.

Quote:
Originally Posted by vadyr View Post
Thirdly, the divisions are too large. Having more divisions (i.e. six divisions) would lessen the amount of teams in each division and allow each team to participate in more matches. Scouting would be more manageable for less experienced teams. This year, there were six or seven regionals occurring simultaneously each week. Next year there will be 41 regionals in five weeks, averaging to over 8 fields a week. At least one week will require 9 fields. Thus, FIRST will have enough fields for each of the 6 divisions, two practice fields, and the Einstein field.
The number of teams in each division at the Championships has not changed in several years; they have always been about 85 teams. As this has been discussed before, there will most likely never be six divisions at the Championship Event. Logistically, it would be impossible to fit six FRC fields into the GA Dome, in addition to the daVinci and Einstein fields. There is no way you'd ever be able to "comfortably" fit eight fields on the floor space of the Dome.

If you try to cram more fields into there, you start getting into issues like the audio/game announcements with one field being clearly audible from another causing confusion, etc. among spectators. You also have to get enough qualified volunteers to run two additional fields, which might prove very difficult, especially for "key" positions.
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Art Dutra IV
Robotics Engineer, VEX Robotics, Inc., a subsidiary of Innovation First International (IFI)
Robowranglers Team 148 | GUS Robotics Team 228 (Alumni) | Rho Beta Epsilon (Alumni) | @arthurdutra

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