2006 Pittsburgh Regional

[jessjank.]

Hey everyone,
First off, wanted to say thank you to everyone for making the Pittsburgh Regional such an awesomely fun event. It's small size (only 24 teams because of it being a coinciding weekend with other events in relatively close proximity) was both a positive and negative factor. It was definitely to my advantage as a first time volunteer in a highly intense position(s). I ended up being the Pit Administration Supervisor and Pit Announcer... it did get very hectic at times but was definitely a blast... especially having to deal with and wear two headsets/radios. There should eventually be some pics floating around of that (Pete Kieselbach? John Larock? Make sure you send them to me!). And there's some pretty funny videos of me kicking the team's out of the pits at the end of the day Friday... hopefully that will come up later because I'd love to see it... haha.

Competition match wise I really didn't get to see many matches because of my job in the pit but the ones I did were definitely high quality. There ended up being quite a bit of field problems and matches ended up running almost 2 hours late! But everything was eventually running smoothly. It ended up being decided that due to the small size of the competition, only 7 alliances would be made for the finals, giving the first seeded alliance (the eventual Champions) a bye (sp?) round during the quarter-finals. Lists of all the alliances (and final match results), final standings, and award recipients are all online and up to date at http://www.usfirst.org/robotics/2006/regional/Pitt.htm

In the alliance of 63, 365, and 1708, team 1708 (the team I mentor) was having robot problems and ended up having to be replaced by 859. None the less, I am so very proud of my new team and cannot wait to see how much they grow next year with all their gained experience. It is such a wonderful new experience for me to be serving as a team mentor after those 4 years on 103 as a team member... I truly love being able to use my experience to help others develop and grow. Also a HUGE congratulations to 1708's head mentor, Mike Dischner, for winning the Pittsburgh volunteer of the year award. He truly deserves it. If you ever get a chance to meet him, please do so because he is an exceptional individual.

Congratulations to the winning alliance, teams 395, 1038, 1743 (go rookies!!!), the finalists, teams 393. 1629, and 1370, to all other teams for all there hard work, dedication, and successes, and a big congratulation to MOE, 365, for once again having the honor of the Chairman's Award bestowed upon them and of course congrats to their very own John Larock for his Woodie Flower's Award. I wish everyone the best of luck as they proceed on through the rest of the Regionals and eventually move on to Championships.

A GIGANTIC thank you to all of the people who made this event happen. All the coordinator types (David, Louisa, Katie, Shawna, and Krista, and Pete (the Technical Advisor) are simply amazing people), volunteers (referees, judges, field people, pit peoples, etc etc ett... soooo many awesome people!), site staff, and of course team members and mentors. I got to speak to, know, and work with some truly outstanding people and I can't wait to do so again next season at the Pittsburgh Regional. I would totally love to give a shout out to everyone I met, but there are way toooo many of you and I would definitely miss someone (and that would make me very upset).

So anyway, thank you and congratulations to everyone! I will certainly never forget this experience.