What is your favorite event venue (or event at all) for any competition you have been to? FTC and FLL count! I am curious on what cool places there have been competitions.
Worlds doesn’t count!
My favorite non-worlds event was the Texas Cup at the Alamo Dome.
For in-season, the Midwest Regional. Great venue, location, and volunteer crew, and I loved the historical videos being shown between matches.
For off-season, Beach Blitz in FRC and Chicago Robotics Invitational in FTC. Both events put a lot of emphasis on the team experience coming first, and are very well-organized and planned.
The first year they ran the Great Northern Regional (I haven’t been there since) it was amazing. They had a full real field for practice and had plenty of excess space it didn’t feel too tight.
I kind of miss the old convention center in Kansas City. I don’t miss the hotel where I got lost once by entering the wrong elevator that went to an entirely different set of rooms than the other elevators.
(disclaimer: I was only there in 2015 and missed the years where things were, by all accounts, extremely bad)
That being said, the venue for Great Northern was excellent and Central Illinois is a personal favorite of mine. If an event were to happen near me, I would love to see it emulate CIR’s setup using the gym for the pits and stadium for the field.
My freshman year, my first ever regional, 3512 went to the LA regional where the “More than Robots” Documentary took place. I will say, LA as a city may not be my favorite but I do like it a lot. This event was special to me on so many levels as it being my first and only regional during 2020. I remember Kremer getting hit in the face with a water bottle (by accident) by one of our mentors while we were sitting down talking in the corner. I got so many pins from that event, from teams like 987, 4201, and a bunch of others. I remember spending a lot of time with the team in the pool, just messing around and having fun, then afterwards playing smash bros with friends. It was the regional that made me realize: I was going to invest a lot of time into this team.
BONUS ROUND: VENTURA 2022
Im going to put this as a bonus cause ventura was amazing and last season, our team got finalists with 2135 and 2637, against 4414, 359, and 5089. I remember that there was so much energy at that regional and it was just so much fun, it was my first regional back from 2020 and it was just the right amount of chaos. then after that 3512 went on to win chairmans at CVR and then proceed onto worlds.
I really love IRI. I’ve been twice and it was such a great event all around. The venue itself wasn’t much to write home about but it’s just such a well run event.
Is this a trick question? The Indiana Robotics Invitational is what every other event aspires to be. It’s the Masters of our sport, with corn on the cob instead of azaleas.
Only MSC comes close. CMP is a distant third.
If we’re talking FRC Regionals, then my heart belongs to St. Louis. Best crew ever.
In FiM, we have quite a few good District events. But again, I’m personally all in for St. Joseph.
I’m gonna be very biased, but Istanbul/Bosphorus is a 6 day dance party with some robots on the side. And some really neat lights (that aren’t strobey). I’ve been to a great many different regionals on three continents, and my own home region is by far my favorite. I haven’t seen the energy matched in other places. (Though I need to see Mexico and Brazil).
FiM West Michigan for the win! Great venue, great teams, great history. It is sure shaping up to be an epic district in 2023 as well with some incredible teams attending
Michigan state championship is awesome. I just absolutely loath the pit flooring, it’s the worst to roll your robot across, will definitely let you know if you have any questionable wiring connections. We ended up hot gluing all the connections. Yet, Having 4 fields going at once is amazing
Yeah, would be great if SVSU could replace those plastic tiles with something more robust. We’ve been changing out the Colsons on our robot cart for pneumatic wheels as part of our States prep. Still hate the pit surface.
The 2019 LA regional was really cool, they held it at the LA convention center which is right next to the staples center and post comp we went to the kings game.
On another note, Tidal tumble, besides the fact of being very well ran, the venue is on the beachfront. The driver stations to the sand is no more than 1000 feet. Its super cool and my favorite venue.