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Re: [FVC]: Longer competitions
MM,
With only 4 or 5 students on an FVC team, it is hard to split them up, but your experiences are an argument for either having fewer matches, OR for dividing up the team during the competition. Other options exist too.
For example: - One person scouts future opponents in the field and in the pits.
- One person has a strategy kick-off with future allies, keeps the batteries charged, and fetches emergency spares from the pits to the field.
- Two people operate the robot, finish the strategy conversation with allies, and maintain the robot.
Obivously there are other ways to organize. Obviously if the team is cross-trained, the members can swap jobs once or twice during the tournament.
You are right that if everyone is making the hike from the pits to the field and back every 60 minutes, then everyone is losing about 45 minutes of productivity during those 60. Slowing down the pace of the matches is one degree of freedom that can be used to reduce this waste (Seems dissatisfying). Changing the location of the field or pits is another option (tough). Dividing the team to conquer the jobs is another way (Seems fairly easy to me, but maybe others would hate it).
Blake
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