[Ken Streeter]

We have so many great memories from the North Carolina Regional and so many people to thank that it is hard to try to get them all in to one posting!

First off, I want to thank Marie Hopper and all of the other volunteers who planned, organized, and conducted the event! The event ran very smoothly, and the venue was fantastic! Even starting before the event with helpful information updates, through load-in, practice rounds, inspections, qualifications, eliminations, and closing ceremonies, all aspects were well-planned and effectively executed. There didn't seem to be anything "rookie" about this regional -- this was a top-notch FIRST regional event. Thanks so much for all of your labors to make this event a resounding success!

I'd also like to commend Andy Baker and the tech inspection crew -- from what I observed, inspections were conducted efficiently and fairly -- it seemed that inspectors did their best to help teams resolve problems when needed, while maintaining an encouraging "can do" attitude!

Now, on to the teams that I particularly remember for various reasons, in roughly chronological order:

2108 - We so much enjoyed being located next to you in the pits! You perfectly exemplified "southern hospitality" from the first moments we met you with your assistance setting up our pit shelving! Then, you helped us locate a Fastenal to purchase the M3-20 socket head cap screws we needed, loaned us various tools we didn't have room to bring down from New Hampshire, and used your awesome battery-powered band saw to help fabricate some spare parts for us. We're just sorry that we didn't end up on the same alliance in any of the qualification matches -- some "Awkward Mechanical Turtle Mayhem" would have been fun!

122 - Thanks so much for providing some essential 80/20 brackets to our team at a time when we really needed them! Without your quick assistance, we would have had to work a lot harder to fabricate brackets for mounting our replacement herding bar!

379 - Thanks for your show of gracious professionalism and helping others by letting us look at your award-winning business plan! We would very much appreciate it if when you get all unpacked, you could send us a copy -- hopefully the business card I gave your pit coaches is still around somewhere; if not, we should be able to re-connect via CD!

1533 - We were ecstatic to see that you were able to overcome the struggles with getting your autonomous code to work in Java -- there's definitely nothing quite like seeing an autonomous program work like it is supposed to!

435 - In qualification match 50, which was a key match for our team being that it was against the #1 and #3 seeded alliances, you perfectly executed our alliance strategy, playing phenomenal defense on 1086 in midfield. I don't think anybody would have thought it possible to hold them to only 1 goal for the entire match!

1311 - Your contributions in match 50 against team 2614 were also key to our alliance winning that match -- without a victory in that match, we couldn't have climbed back up the rankings to be the #2 seed. Thanks!

1811 - In the pre-match strategy sessions for qualification match 56, your drive team described your robot's limitations with more honesty and emphasis than I have ever encountered. By accurately describing your robot's limitations, you enabled our alliance (with team 900) to come up with a winning strategy for that match! If you had instead optimistically over-represented your robot's capabilities, our alliance would not have stood a chance at winning that match. I can only hope that our team will describe our robot's capability limitations as honestly, too! Thank you!

900 - I am very impressed by your gracious professionalism in the pre-match strategy sessions for match 56! That match was a perfect example of the conflict between needs to showcase one's robot in order to be picked for elimination rounds, and the need to work out a winning alliance strategy. Your graciousness in subordinating your team's own need to showcase your hanging ability and instead adopt a match strategy which didn't involve your team hanging was highly commendable! Thanks to your willingness to do that, our alliance achieved 26 ranking points in that match, one of the highest tallies in the tournament. Without that match being won by our alliance, we couldn't have finished as the #2 seed -- we couldn't have done it with out you. Thank you! We're also so glad that you were indeed picked for the eliminations -- in the first round even!

79 - I was very impressed by your robot's ability to so easily bulldoze balls up and over the bump out of midfield into the near zone -- at first glance, it looks like that should be so easy to do, but so few robots can do it at all, and your robot makes it look absolutely trivial. I don't know how you managed to get the geometry right for that, but you clearly have perfected it. Awesome job!

1772 - We were ever so glad to have you as alliance partners! Your team did everything we could have hoped for in the elimination matches and more! As a "striker", your robot was definitely the cream of the crop at the North Carolina regional -- not only scoring practically every ball that we and 1741 could feed into the near zone, but making frequent excursions out into the midfield to get more balls to score because we couldn't feed you balls fast enough! We're sorry to have let you down in the quest to bring home a regional win, but the battle damage to our robot was too extensive to effectively pick up balls in autonomous mode during the finals -- if only we had been able to clear the far zone autonomously in those matches, the final outcome might have been different. (It's a little too late for North Carolina, but we now have permanent fixes to the battle-damage issues for Atlanta -- maybe we'll be in the same division and can make a run at Einstein together.) From my perspective, it was your team that really carried our alliance in the finals! Well done!

1741 - We were astounded that your team was still available to be picked -- our scouting information put you much, much higher than the seeding scores! Your contribution to our finalist alliance with respect to strategy, starting flexibility, and reliable operation was unparalleled! I really thought that after winning the first of the finals matches we had a good shot at upsetting the #1 alliance -- thanks for having been a part of a great run!

48 - It was pretty clear to us that in the final rounds, your robot and its impressive drivetrain would be called upon to play "counter-D" (keeping us from defending 1086 in our far zone) against us in the elimination matches -- you can be very sure that we weren't particularly pleased about the prospects of doing that!

1902 - Congrats on being the #1 pick of the tournament -- your contribution to the winning alliance was an essential one! We were particularly impressed by the improvement on your robot throughout the tournament -- you went from being one of the "middle of the pack" robots at the beginning of qualification matches to one of the elite robots at the end -- well done!

1086 - Your team is a real class act, not just in terms of having built a great robot and leading the #1 seed alliance to victory, but with regard to your gracious professionalism, too! In the first finals match, when we and 48 become locked in an "A-frame" position with all wheels off the ground for both us and 48, your coming over to "free the deadlock" and restore us all to operation was a very classy move! Congratulations on the second regional win -- it is extremely well deserved.

I'm sure I must have left a few teams out, as there were just too many excellent teams at this regional to remember everybody I should thank.

Thanks again to all the organizers for having made the North Carolina Regional a top-notch event, and for everybody we talked to for extending us extremely welcoming hospitality! We'd love to come back again next year!