(emphasis mine)
So this system will lock in states so out-of-state teams can’t compete at other state’s regionals? I would love that. Currently, Wisconsin doesn’t have enough teams to require qualifying events, so out-of-state teams see the WI regional as an easy target, because they don’t have to qualify for it. And as a result, Wisconsin teams didn’t get to advance.
You are correct.
I don’t think the implementation of Super-Regional Championship tournaments does anything to lock in States. Please check the FAQ on the FIRST website.
Can I pick which Super-Regional I want to attend once I qualify?
No. Each Championship will advance teams to a specified Super-Regional. It does not matter where your team is located; you will advance to the Super-Regional designated for the Championship where you qualify.
My reading of this policy is that a team from state X could compete in the Championship system of state Y if they have been and will continue to allow teams from out of state to still compete at their event(s).
I suppose that statement would make it so you could compete within your region… but this system is designed to discourage teams from competing at events far beyond their region in a last hope to make a seat a world/region championships.
South Carolina in particular had a large problem with that this past season. Not to say we didn’t enjoy the competition from out of state…but when only one or two in-state teams are placing in any given award category it gets a bit discouraging to the teams that you would like to see returning to the FTC program…and not getting dragged away by the new allure that VEX seems to be pushing in our state.
We are one of those teams that travels to other states to compete. Up until now, Illinois has held their qualifiers in November and a championship in December. Competing in other states lengthened our season and experience. It also provided us the opportunity to meet a lot of great teams–some of whom we still keep in contact.
Not all the out of state tournaments were championships, some were regional qualifiers too, but admittedly the chance of getting to Worlds from an out of state championship did have its attraction.
This year IL is running 6 qualifiers over a couple months and the state championship in February. I’m pretty sure this will impact our out of state ventures but with a little luck we might be able to participate in at least one.
Why did they put the North Super-Regional the same weekend as Midwest FRC regional? We are a community based FRC team but are starting 3 FTC teams in 3 high schools this year. If one of the FTC teams goes to Super-Regional our Mentors, Students, & Volunteers would be split. I guess we will have to go to Central IL (if it is not Week 6) & Wisc. Regionals.
I actually think they chose the date wisely. There are only five possible weekends to hold the super regional, bracketed by Indiana State FTC championship (the last state champs, I believe), and Worlds. You can’t have the super regional before all of the state championship events, and you really don’t want to have the super regional the week right after that since that would only be a five day gap between competitions. So really, you’re looking at FRC week 4, 5, 6, 7, or the week before Champs. Week before champs is bad since that would be only a 3 day gap between trips.
So that leaves week 5, 6, and 7. Week 5 has at least three FRC regionals, so that’s the worst option if you only care about FRC vs FTC conflicts. Between week 6 and 7 with one event each in the Midwest, I could go either way. Conflicting with MSC and being one week later isn’t a great option, in my opinion.
March 15: FRC Week 3, plus Indiana State FTC Champs
March 22: 5 days after Indiana FTC, plus FRC Week 4, Wisconsin + Kansas City + Boilermaker + Buckeye
March 29: FRC Week 5, Minneapolis 10K/North Star + Queen City
April 5: Week 6, Midwest
April 12: Week 7, Michigan State Champs
April 19: 4 days until World Championship
The April 5th weekend gives teams two full weeks between super regional and Worlds, which sounds about right.
I do empathize with your teams, though. We also have FTC + FRC, and it creates some tricky calendar choices.
Does anyone know around how many teams will be advancing from the State Championships to the Super Regionals? Will it vary by the number of FTC teams in the state, number of states in the region, or will it be the same number across the board for every State Championship? I read on the Oregon FTC website that they will be advancing 11 teams to Super Regionals. If anyone knows anything about the East Region (specifically New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delware, and Maryland) it would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
JIT
According to the info given at lower Hudson qualifier (http://csis.pace.edu/~firsttech/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/FTC-program-lower-hudson-2014-FINAL.pdf), the East Region super-regional will have 72 teams coming from 12 championships. Assuming the same number of teams from each championship, it means that six teams advance from each one.
It is not safe to assume that the same number of teams will advance from each Championship tournament.
I as a state affiliate partner have access to the information on how many teams from each state qualify I just am not sure if I’m allowed to post the list here.
I can say this, it is a scaled number of teams per state based on the number of teams in the state.
I also mispoke earlier and some teams might already know this. The allowing of out of state teams into a state championship is left to the disgression of the Affiliate Partner, not FIRST in reality. I closed the South Carolina Championship off to out of state teams for the immidiate future because of the recent short comings of the FTC program within the state.
3 Qualified teams from SC are:
Team 3864 Global Force - Inspire & (1st Seed & Finalist Alliance Captain)
Team 327 Gamma Factor - Winning Alliance Captain & 2nd Place Inspire
Team 208 KC Robotics - Winning Alliance 2nd Pick
Hello, I was wondering if it is at all possible to compete at the Super-Regional without qualifying? Say a team did very well at their state competition and was extremely close to qualifying but was not able to due to the number of spots given for Super Regional…could there be a slight possibility for other teams that did not qualify at their competition to attend and compete?
I dont think so… Each state has the main people that qualified, and then the alternatives. If a main cant go, the alternatives are then called up. Most of the time, it stays with the main people, rarely does a main drop out.
You’ll find the team invitation list here http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprograms/ftc/super-regionals
"How can I sign up for a Super-Regional?
Teams must qualify to attend Super-Regional events through their performance at a regional Championship event. Eligible teams will receive an invitation with registration instructions after their state or regional Championship. See below for details on the advancement criteria."
I guess if you didn’t receive an invitation then you can’t compete at a Super-Regional.
I agree with your sentiments. As a MD team, we’ve played in MD, WV, DE and OH. We like the diversity.
We don’t do it because we see an “easy target” in another state. Quite the contrary, we like the stiff competition. This year we competed in Ohio so we could attempt to progress to the IOWA Super Regional. We have a tour of the John Deer factory planned. It will be a great experience for our Rural team.
See you there!!!
Phil.
Just wanted to follow up on this post from the early discussion in this thread. Staffing was and is always an issue. We were fortunate at the South Super-Regional to have many FTC heavy hitters from all across the South as well as strong support from the Texas and Oklahoma FTC partners. If you have the time and ability, I urge the FTC community to volunteer at the North, East, and/or West Super-Regional this year as FTC needs your support. Log into VIMS and sign up. I think a link was sent out recently. If I find it, I’ll add a new post with just the links. Others who may have the links are welcome to post it before me if able.
In regards to wifi, we learned a lot from the previous three years of running the combined events here in San Antonio. This year was our best year in that regard. We were able to increase the number and types of technology we used to monitor, detect and decrease the amount of wifi traffic in the competition space. Three big efforts included: the use of Fluke meters with directional functionality to quickly locate hotspots, placing FTC fields in a ballroom with a physical wall separating the competition fields from all the FRC and FTC pits as well as the FRC fields, and more FTAs and a one man wifi sniffer supported by web-based monitoring equipment at HQ. The grand total of hotspots detected and shut down during 2 full days of competition was 50! One from a FRC coach in the stands of the FRC field who didn’t understand why it was an issue. We also sent out a crack crew of veteran FRC teams to all of the FRC rookies on Thursday, FRC inspection day, to help the rookies understand what “bridge mode” is and how to set up their robot for competition. This would have been caught during FRC robot inspections, but rookies tend to be the last in that line so we wanted to catch that issue sooner rather than later.
End result, this year with more FTC teams and the same number of 64 FRC teams in the space, we ran our two division event without many replays due to technology. We consistently ran 12 matches per hour which averages to 5 minute turns. Not checking FTA post action reports and going from memory, I think our first technology related replay came during the elimination rounds and was due to a faulty joystick.
FRC and FTC can coexist but it takes more volunteers and more technology as well as some prudent logistics to make it work as well as we were able to this season at the Alamo FRC regional / FTC South Super-Regional Championship.