LAS VEGAS REGIONAL... terminated?

[tcjinaz]

Originally Posted by seg9585

And here I was thinking how great Vegas would be to hold future FRC Championship events. Vegas has so much hotel capacity, such large convention centers and arenas, and is easily accessible by air from everywhere.

Vegas was our go-to as a second regional because all other SoCal regionals filled up immediately. The Santa Barbara Regional should ease that a little next year, but travel to SB is logistically equivalent at least from where my team is located in Orange County (still need a hotel, etc).
Another reason VEgas was special was it featured so many high-caliber teams. The winners or finalists of the LA, San Diego, Inland Empire, Arizona, and Utah Regionals were all present in Vegas this year!

Vegas is probably not really thrilled about the business generated by FIRST. In my field, the IEEE/ACM Design Automation Conference is the place to be in June. It used to be in Vegas fairly regularly (my first in 1982), but around 2001 the hotels/casinos started looking at how much "side" (gambling) business was being generated and decided DAC was not profitable enough for them, and it has not been back since.