If the direction that FVC has taken holds true (FLL based) then I do not see multiple day tournaments as being a viable option to address the issues raised. I attended 3 FVC State tournaments this year and while they each had their own style and flavor, the common issue I saw was “allotment of time”. Each tournament had between 29 and 33 teams that participated. They each had 2 fields and ran between 4-6 qualifying matches. For the Georgia tournament that held 6 matches it made for a very long day for teams, volunteers and the hosting venue….. almost 12 hours. This was in addition to other observations and/or problems that I believe can easily be addressed. My opinion is that 4 qualifying matches is a disservice to teams that may have spent significant hours designing, building, practicing and otherwise preparing for a competition like FVC. In Georgia, our current plan is to have tournaments with at least 6 qualifying matches. This may change if the format changes, but for now that is the plan. A bare minimum would be 5 matches but that would be in the rare case where we have too many teams to run more matches, and not enough teams to organize 2 separate tournaments.
With that said, here is my take on this.
- Keep qualifying and non-qualifying tournaments to one day. It may be a long day depending on the number of teams, but the one-day formula can work. This may mean that you limit the number of teams to that which can reasonably compete in a single day event.
- State tournaments can go to 2 days (or 1-1/2 days) especially if the team count goes above 35 and there are 6+ matches per team.
- Although this adds cost and creates the problem of integrating the data from 2 separate scoring tables, we should find a way to run 3-4 fields during a tournament. It would be a plus if this can be done from one scoring system rather than two. This can alleviate the problem felt this year not only by the championship event but also at all FVC tournaments.
- At all 3 events that I attended, tournaments each had different flavors of FIRST. Meaning that if someone walked in off the street and saw what was going on, they may not know that it had any thing to do with FIRST. Part of this is probably due to the tight schedule, part due to rookie teams, and part due to the organization of the affiliate partner. People should walk away from the event knowing more than they did when they came in about FIRST and its goals.
- This is not an FVC issue directly, but scrimmages should be run in the various regions where tournaments will be held. Not only is that an invaluable tool for what will now be veteran teams, but also rookies who have no idea what FIRST is all about can be introduced to the concept of Gracious professionalism prior to arriving at a hectic tournament.
- The championship event…… well goes beyond saying that more qualifying matches are needed. With the program growth in the number of teams from around 150 to 550, a plan needs to be in place to accommodate the number of teams participating while running more than 4 qualifying matches. I believe that for now, 100 FVC teams at the championship is a good number but we need to accommodate them better. Item number 3 above is the obvious first pass solution to this on the competition side. I welcome other suggestions to address this problem.
Just another observation…. I personally do not believe that the FVC program will fit perfectly into the FLL mold for tournament organization. From what can see there could be rapid growth to rival FLL along with the competitive format that FRC enjoys. I think a hybrid format maybe better suited for the program. For instance, this may mean that we keep the local 1-2-3 tier tournament structure at the local level, But at the championship event, there are organized divisions that feed the elimination matches. I am also not entirely fond of teams that did not even make it to the elimination matches in their state tournaments, getting to the championship through a lottery. I would much rather see the runner up alliances from each tournament put into a lottery and given the opportunity to go to the championship. I gotta say that I saw some very good 2nd place alliance teams that would have easily gotten to the quarter or semi-finals in the championship. It’s just too bad that they were left behind because they were not lucky enough.