Houston or EPCOT?

[Kit Gerhart]

Houston had its advantages. It was much better for watching matches, especially the finals, with the field being on the floor and the stands elevated. A non-Houston-related thing I liked was mixing the finals matches with the awards. It was good for the teams in the finals because it allowed them more cool down time and more repair time, if needed. I liked it as a spectator, because it separated the speeches with the excitement of the matches. As has been mentioned by many others, the downside of Houston's competition site was the long walk and steep ramps for the drive teams.

That said, overall, I much prefer Epcot for making the Championship a fun event. It is hard to imagine a better place, anywhere in the world, for 10,000 teenagers to stay entertained and have fun safely, and without getting into trouble. If you stay in All Star Sports/Music/Movies, you have the swimming pools, arcades, etc. right there, and you have transportation to and from all the parks. Disney is just a fun place to spend a few days. It is kind of expensive, but the cost per person wasn't that much higher than at Houston.

Our hotel in Houston, on the other hand, had a pool, but the water was so cold that almost no one used it, and that was about it for "entertainment" at the hotel. Also, I think most people felt that it was not the sort of location where you would want a bunch of kids to take off on their own to have fun. The Six Flags park in Houston seemed ill-prepared for the size of our group at the gate when the awards ceremony ended. It took way too long to get in, and then there was the food...

Still, those who set up the competition venue at Epcot might be able to learn some things from the Houston event, and from the regionals. Maybe I'm missing something, but it would seem that having the Einstein field lower to the ground, and having the bleachers closer to the field and higher would make things much better for watching the matches there. A place like Reliant would always have the advantage of being an indoor facility, though.

There are a number of priorities involved in orgainizing the Championship and selecting a site, and an important one is to make the event FUN. Disney is probably the best place in the world for that to happen.