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Unread 13-10-2008, 14:06
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Re: Location Suggestion for 2010 Championship

You could probably host it in Houston again at either Reliant Park, or the George R Brown Convention Center, provided you followed a different event layout/strategy than currently.

Specifically, forget all about the current methodology of having every single playing field in a giant stadium, cramming the divisional fields in as best you can around Einstein. It's ridiculous, since it's physically impossible to acoustically isolate the divisional fields in a space that open. You end up with a cacophony of fields talking over each other, seating that's only on one side of the field and often too far away, and money wasted on an Einstein setup that sits (mostly) unused for 2 days. Not to mention the pit to field walks for robots and spectators attempting to keep track of things.

Instead, go with a true divisional model. Rent out a convention center big enough to house 4 divisions of pits and fields. Put each division's field adjacent to its pit, with rented stadium seating, AV, etc. The fields can be separated enough and intimate enough to keep sound levels down and give the MCs a chance to actually be heard. Plus, walking times are ridiculously short, and you can have seating on either side of a field. When it comes time for the Finals on Einstein, move everyone to a nearby stadium/arena where Einstein has been set up the night before. Everyone always has to do the mass pit exodus for Finals anyways, so I don't think this is terribly different. If necessary, let divisional champs drag half their pit with them. You'll still get an awesome venue for the Finals action, without having to waste the space and equipment rental for it to sit idle for 2 days, plus you get a higher quality divisional experience. Granted, you don't have a convenient gigantic dumping space for superfluous team members, since divisional seating isn't going to have quite the overflow space of a huge stadium... but I think it'd work rather well.

Here's my specific pitch. Divisional competition in George R Brown CC. It should be easily sizable enough for 4 divisions and whatever extra FIRST goodness you want. It's also downtown, with lots of hotels and entertainment, and not any scarier than downtown Atlanta we're already dealing with. Einstein Finals to be held in the Toyota Center, home of the Houston Rockets. It's huge, and FIRST has already shown that basketball arena are a good fit for FRC fields. After party to be held on the Discovery Green Park and/or Level 3 of the George R Brown CC.

You could do something similar with the Reliant Convention Center + Reliant Stadium, but the hotel situation isn't as nice, and Reliant Stadium is HUGE. Much like the Georgia Dome. The advantage of a basketball arena for the finals is that it ends up much much more intimate.
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