build season needs to be longer.

[gblake]

Originally Posted by Kevin Sevcik

Pretty sure a lot of top-ranked teams would disagree with you on this. Also a lot of mentor family members. My wife, in particular, laughs every time I claim FRC has a 6-week build season.

And I'm pretty sure that you mean that many teams that do well on-the-field choose to work beyond the 44 days in various legal ways.

I know working on the Withholding Allowance parts is in addition to the 44 days.
I know that time spent during competitions, is in addition to the 44 days.
I know that legal prep/practice before kickoff is more than the 44 days.
I know that off-season events is more than the 44 days.

I also know that many of the members of the teams that do well on the field are able to do that without letting the rest of their lives get out-of-kilter.

However, none of that changes two things.
A) The reason(s) the program currently presents all teams with the challenge(s) it does, and
B) Investing time into building and operating an uber-bot is by no means the only dimension of being a top-ranked FRC team. Many teams that build uber-bots are good at many other aspects of FRC (and vice-versa), but building uber-bots is not the same thing as succeeding at FRC.

My thesis was and is that each time someone wishes for a longer build season, it's worth pausing for a minute to ask if what they are wishing for is really necessary for succeeding at FRC. In my experience, the answer is usually an easy, "No."