SCRRF Fall Classic

[ChrisH]

I'm sooo glad every body had a good time. We tried a few different things which all seemed to work out well. The soccer game and the mentor's round seemed very popular. So did finishing pretty much on time.

We came very close to cancelling the event. With 10 days to go we only had six teams signed up. There was no way we could cover expenses at that level of participation. Besides it would be really hard to keep audience interest. I managed to connect with a few team leaders and we picked up a few more. When we figured we would break even we decided to go for it even though we wanted more teams.

I would still like to see faster cycle times on the matches. We were cycling at 10-15 minutes per match, which is long. Much of the time seemed to be connected to battery and frequency changes. But when robots are coming off to get right back in the que and teams change their battery in line, it is hard to tell them to go faster. More robots would have actually made things better.

We could have done better on the food situation, but we didn't think there would be enough people to make special arraingements worthwhile.

I think we're going to have to build a new field, but this one is pretty old. FIRST retired it in 2001, back when robots were way less powerful. So we've certainly gotten good use from it.

So we'll do it again next year. SCRRF promises we will try to do better in the areas we know need improving and we hope teams will improve on their attendance and punctuality in letting us know they are coming.

Many thanks to all who helped. Team 599 and especially EricRobodox and Mr. Van, Team 968, Team 1138, Team 1070, Tarek Shribati, Terry Wells and Mike Neary, Team 4, Sanddrag, Ken Leung, DCAFan, JJack, the Scouts who helped score, Nancy McIntyre, IndieFan, EricH, and I must have forgotten somebody. It wasn't on purpose, honest!

ChrisH
President SCRRF