2002--Here we go again

[Ken Loyd]

This is my fifth year as an advisor to Team #64. Every year when the changes are announced it seems everyone goes wacko. Once the regionals start, the fun begins. I have faith in Dean and Woody and the rest of the folks at FIRST. Why not wait until the first saturday in January rolls around before unloading your travel bags.

[Mike Norton]

Originally posted by Ken Loyd
This is my fifth year as an advisor to Team #64. Every year when the changes are announced it seems everyone goes wacko. Once the regionals start, the fun begins. I have faith in Dean and Woody and the rest of the folks at FIRST. Why not wait until the first saturday in January rolls around before unloading your travel bags.

This is my 8th year and the schools 9th year. This is the first year they took the chance of proving that the best robot is going to win.

They did this because teams have to be able to plan ahead. I can not plan to go to Fl. in a short time period. So If our team wins a regional that is it.

So when you say wait until the regional starts before the fun begins. I say the fun is out before the regional began.

That is why this is our last year with FIRST.

I started to plan for this year competition last April. So this change was a shock. So I will see what this is going to do for FIRST.

Just sit back and enjoy this ride, it is going to be a crazy one.

[Shelley_delphi chick]

FIRST is always full of new ideas and ways of doing things. Why does everyone seem to be going crazy because there are a few rules that we need to follow this year. Everyone needs to come down off hyper and mad mode and concentrate on making 2002 a year to rember and learn from.

Shelley

[Mike Rush]

I've been in this as long as Ken(wonder how that could be?). Ever since my second year I knew that this day was going to happen(limits on Nationals). It was always physics for me. You can only put so much mass into a given volume without compressing it beyond recognition. This is a description of the nationals. We can argue forever on how the limits were to be implemented ( I personally dont like the original team year bye ), but FIRST had to make up a set of rules and they did . You can be sure of one thing... next years rules will be different again!

Relax and don't think this years changes are the end of existence as we know it. Some teams will decide to not participate. Other teams will decide to start. This is the way it has been, and will continue to be.

[Ken Leung]

I also recall how teams weren't exactly happen when FIRST release the 4 vs. 0 format... A lot of teams insisted on how it would hurt the competition and FIRST growth in general, and only a few people tried supporting it.

Well, there are good side and bad side about all these... And sometimes the good sides aren't oblivious to people. After all, we need to see the actual competition to tell the real effect.

For last year, turn out 4 vs. 0 was really good at bonding teams together. Teams in west coast work with each other a lot more now... it never would've happened if it was always head to head competition. And then, there were downsides to that format, such as unfriendly to spectators or media...

As for this year, who knows if there will be good side to all these new rules. There are now 193 teams registered for the Champ. event with 5 more spots. So, even though Nats is limited, maybe now FIRST will have more resource to cover some other things, such as more media coverage and more regional the year afterward.

I will be thrilled if there will be 20 regionals the year after. Talk about growth rate!

[Shelley_delphi chick]

Everyone is so busy finding thngs wrong already that no one is looking at the BIG picture!! Thank you Ken for trying to look at things in a different light!!


Shelley

[Wayne Doenges]

I just want to get our team cranked up and produce a kick-bot robot and let the chips (aluminum chips that is) fall where they may.

I have been coming to this forum for the past 5 months and the feeling I get is that the good teams take the rules in stride and do the best they can. The rest of the teams, well...

Wayne Doenges

[David Kelly]

Originally posted by Wayne Doenges
I have been coming to this forum for the past 5 months and the feeling I get is that the good teams take the rules in stride and do the best they can. The rest of the teams, well...

Wayne Doenges

i agree with you 110% wayne. all the successful teams take any roadblocks and/ or boundries and tear them down. you have to have strive to be the best team in the country. there will be absolutely NO way you will be able to get there if all you do is complain. don't give up, anything is possible.

[Mike Norton]

Originally posted by David Kelly


i agree with you 110% wayne. all the successful teams take any roadblocks and/ or boundries and tear them down. you have to have strive to be the best team in the country. there will be absolutely NO way you will be able to get there if all you do is complain. don't give up, anything is possible.

you have to have strive to be the best team in the country.

You have not been reading all the threads. To be the best team in FIRST completition you need money!!!! Because the way they set up this year completition if you do not have lots of money you can not plan on going to the national.

How fair is that. Our team has been in the top 10 at the national for the last 4 years. We do not have much money but we always made sure we went to the completition to prove how good our robot is.

All we ask for is a fair chance. If you think this is a bad complaint then so be it.

[Wayne Doenges]

Mike N., you said it takes money to get into the Nats. I disagree. You can have all the money in the world and you still won't go to the Nats, this year, if you don't qualify. Or are an odd number team.
I see that you are an odd numbered team and I understand why you are ticked off. But it seems to me that you have already given up. You are registered for two regionals. If you do well, than you can go to the Nats. You say you have been in the top 10 for the last 4 years. So what happened in all your regionals?
I heard rumors that Team 234 (Cyber Blue) didn't have enough money to go to the Nats, but they did so well in there regionals that there sponsors gave them the money to go to the Nats (at the last minute).
Our team didn't have much money either (we are still in debt) but we didn't let that stop us. We got two Rookie All-Star awards and one second place to qualify for this years competition. And we ARE an odd team number.
So stop whining, dig in and be the best you can be.

Wayne Doenges

btw, it's competition, no completition

[Mike Norton]

So stop whining, dig in and be the best you can be.

If you don't know what is going on here in New England. There are lots of lay-offs , companys are not doing to good. It was hard enough to get money when times were good.

We are only going to one regional this year. I put in for LI regional just in case we could not get approved to go to KSC. The cost per student to go to FL. is $495. we are staying for one week. after we go to KSC regional we are going to Disney for the next 4 days. If we plan to go to National 7 weeks before. that would cost us in the range of $900 per student and that is if we get the plane tickets. Plus the $4,000 to enter.

We won two completition after the National were over.

We paid $250 to the first one which was held in Penn.
We paid $100 in the second one which was in MA.
these were just like the regional completition.

Why can these people put on a great completition for less money than the ones the regionals put on?

We been around long enough. The game has change from making a great robot to making lots of money to play. If more people push back maybe FIRST will look at making things cheaper.

Like I said in many of my other threads. There are teams leaving FIRST because of all that is going on. That does not make them bad people. They still teach robotics but in a different way.

When we Leave FIRST this might not make a impact now but it might in the next couple of years.

[Nate Smith]

Originally posted by Mike Norton

Why can these people put on a great completition for less money than the ones the regionals put on?

We been around long enough. The game has change from making a great robot to making lots of money to play. If more people push back maybe FIRST will look at making things cheaper.

While I can't speak for the first few years, I can say that for as long as I've been in the competition(this is my 5th year,) the registration cost for events only raised when the change was made to letting us keep the control system, rather than having to return it. And as far as that goes, that's an extra $1000 I'm willing to have to part with.

Also, FIRST understands that because of the weaker economy, things are tough for many teams right now. That's why they're having the remote kickoffs. That's why they came to us for the team forum, rather than having all of us go to them. Unfortunately, as far as the regional costs go, there's not a whole lot that they can do. Working with several regional crews personally, I know a large part of the cost goes into the site itself(rental, security, food service, etc.) as well as the lighting and sound. It costs somewhere in the neighborhood of $125,000 to run a regional event of the size and grandeur we've come to expect. And while some of this is offset by corporate donations, remember that your $4000 per event doesn't only go to pay for that event, but also to help offset FIRST's operating costs for the year, as they are a non-profit organization.

[patrickrd]

Originally posted by Ken Leung
For last year, turn out 4 vs. 0 was really good at bonding teams together. Teams in west coast work with each other a lot more now... it never would've happened if it was always head to head competition. And then, there were downsides to that format, such as unfriendly to spectators or media...

At New York City (the regional our team attended), the 4v0 had exactly the opposite effect. Due to one disappointing match after another (the ramp was balanced very few times), teams tended to blame each other. Rules such as disqualifying the whole alliance when a certain team's coach hits the stop button don't help teams bond together either.

Originally posted by Ken Leung
I will be thrilled if there will be 20 regionals the year after. Talk about growth rate!

While 20 would be nice, let's not settle for that. We currently have 17. This year, california clearly needs at least 1 more, perhaps 2. We need one more in the midwest, and one more on the east coast. We need 20 this year, and factor in projected growth for after this year (the "competition format" ought to get a lot more interested in starting new teams), and we're looking at a need for about 24-25 regionals.

Perhaps I'm too optimistic, but that's the way I see it.

[Christina]

Originally posted by patrickrd



While 20 would be nice, let's not settle for that. We currently have 17. This year, california clearly needs at least 1 more, perhaps 2. We need one more in the midwest, and one more on the east coast. We need 20 this year, and factor in projected growth for after this year (the "competition format" ought to get a lot more interested in starting new teams), and we're looking at a need for about 24-25 regionals.

]

This is true. We do need more regionals this year. Hopefully, FIRST will also realize this and try to compensate for it next year (since there isn't anything they can really do now). I think the best we can hope for is for FIRST to learn from all of this.

~Christina