[Grant Cox]

It was really an incredible event. I'd like to start off by giving a huge thank you to everyone at Cass Tech HS who helped to put this on. It was an absolutely fantastic venue with a slew of great Cass people helping out all the FIRST people. The band was awesome to have, the sound system was great, the pits were spacious, and the expansive seating was well appreciated by all in attendance.

Congratulations to 280 on Chairman's, as well as 67/217/3098 for pulling out an impressive finish. 469/1250/1941 you were a crazy alliance and made an unbelievably intense finals (a 2 point difference!!). I'd been watching the two alliances make their ways through the elims and I knew it was going to be an exciting 2-3 final matches. So many diverse robot designs represented in the finals (rolling power dumper, helical turreted shooter, a turreted shooter with a crazy hopper system, and a "traditional" power dumper).

Also a personal 'grats to the Chickens for the spirit award, and a personal high five to HOT for their equally unwavering spirit. You two spearheaded the effort to make this MI district event feel every bit as heart-pounding and exciting as a "real" regional, and by the time we got around to the end of the elims the house was rockin harder than I've felt a FIRST event rock in a long time (barring, say, Atlanta).