Interesting Observations of Week 1

[Wayne TenBrink]

I am a big fan of the FiM system.

Last year we only went to one event. We were badly damaged in our second match Friday morning and didn't get back to full strength until Saturday. It made for a very short and frustrating season.

This year we signed up for three events (36 qual matches) for less money than we spent on one last year. If the same thing happens again, we will still have a full and satisfying season.

Build is great, and its certainly where most of valuable learning takes place, but the continuous improvement that happens during competition is also very important. In 2006 and 2007 we attended two events. Our robot left the second event much improved from when it entered the first one. (Hopefully this year will be no different, OTIS has been working out and building his upper body strength. He should be pumping out the moon rocks quicker than ever at Lansing and WMR, maybe even State!)

Another thing. With all the qualification matches, we are able to give a lot more students a chance to participate on the field. This is a great thing - very "inspirational" to them, and sure to bring them back next year.

I hope everyone in FRC gets this chance soon - but it would be nice to figure out a way to allow teams to play at least one meet outside their "home" district.

[IKE]

Originally Posted by Wayne TenBrink

I hope everyone in FRC gets this chance soon - but it would be nice to figure out a way to allow teams to play at least one meet outside their "home" district.

Agreed. I would love to see a nice mix of district events and Regional Championships. Then I think you could open things up again as long as proximity to the district event was a factor. One of the big issues in MI was out of state teams signing up in MI first because those events would sell out, then signing up for the event in their backyard because it would not sell out.

As a talking point.

I have run these before, but want to keep bringing them up.
Option 1: Using the FiM model of every team gets 2 Districts and 50% will qualify for the State Championship, here are some rough numbers for FRC. With FRC having approximately 1500 teams, if 50% were to go to a "Regional Championship", that would require 1500*50%/60(teams at a R.CHMP). This would require 13 Regional Championships. Looking at a map, I think this would be very rough because teams would have to travel to far. This would also require 75 district events. The Regional Champioships would have to have 60 teams, which not every venue can support. If you downgraded 20 regionals you would need to make about 50 new events. I think that would be a huge undertaking.

Option 2, an intermediate step. Do downgrade 10 regionals to district events and start up 15 more district events. Basically have 25 and 25. Teams will then get 1 district and 1 regional for the current FRC price. Weeks 1-3 are districts, 4-6 are Regional Championships. Do a performance based qualification for Nationals. The end goal would be then to expand the number of district events in subsequent years so that there are enough slots that teams can participate in 2 district events and initial registration would be reduced. At this point, I think you could allow teams to choose whatever events they want to go to, but local teams take precidence. Also at that point, you could spread the qualification criteria for attending teh Championship. This is my favorite option as I think it would be the best method

Option 3, Probably should have been option 1, but is do nothing.

I hope that FiM is improved and allowed to be continued, or that some of its Ideas are adopted by FIRST. It feels like it has some real promise. Personally while option 2 would mean less play for a year (33 typically trys to do 3 events), I would do that if it meant getting to see another positive growth. I also think this format is good for engineering schools to showcase themselves. A regional is incredibly expensive and very difficult to put on. A district event is a ton cheaper. I would love to see district events at Ohio State (Columbus, Ohio), Tri-State (Angola, IN), U of Illinois (Champagne Urbana, Illinois).... They could take on one of these events to showcase their campuses. I know that their are a ton of great schools throughout the country that don't get the advertising of a U of Michigan or MIT, and this could be a good way for them to spend some of that Ad money instead of killing trees (I got probably a dozen letters and postcards from MSOE and probably 50 pounds of other recruiting material).