[Jared Russell]

Steve,

Team-run off-season events are one of my favorite parts of FIRST. They offer a lot of play time for the dollar, tend to be much more "light hearted" than official FIRST competitions, and are a great way to have new team members get a few matches under their belts before it counts. Team 341 regularly attends three off-season events (our own Ramp Riot, 365 and 316's Duel on the Delaware, and 222's PARC) in addition to a slew of others that we've attended from year to year when the timing worked well for us (25's Brunswick Eruption, 236's Bash at the Beach, EDIT: 1403 and 75's Monty Madness, etc.).

However, IRI markets itself a bit differently from most other off-season events. It is an "all star game" of sorts, and its invitational model means that only the best robots get in. As such, many veteran teams are willing to travel further distances in order to prove their meddle. It also helps that IRI is run by two established, role-model teams in 45 and 234, both of whom have many friends across FIRST.

So, my suggestion to you if you want to increase the scope of your event's draw is to:

* Pack a lot of value into your event (many rounds of competition, simultaneous VRC/FTC event, non-robot related activities, etc.) so that distant teams are more likely to invest in nontrivial transportation and lodging costs. Andy and Chris and co. do a great job of this at IRI, and word of mouth has spread like wildfire.

* Use your connections with other teams. At Ramp Riot we routinely draw teams from 5-7 hours away because we have become good friends off the field.

* Reciprocate! If you bring your own team to other, distant events you can form friendships that will result in other teams doing the same. For example, we normally would not have even considered driving from Philadelphia to Connecticut for Bash at the Beach except for the fact that we had known teams like 173 and 236 for years.