Top 5 questions from coaches this week – 9/9
- Where do I register for a tournament? I see the “Event Application” section in the FIRST registration TIMS site but there are no events listed…
- NorCal FLL does not use the FIRST system for Tournament events
- Tournament registration will open in October but there are 2 steps that you have to do ahead (as a prerequisite) of registering… More info here.
- The list of confirmed/mostly confirmed qualifier tournaments for 2015 season is here
- [and relatedly] I want to register for tournament “A” – how do I do that?
- When your team is eligible to register and registration opens, the coach (or their designee) will be able to select 3 tournaments within the team’s district and then be assigned by a simple system to one of those 3 choices. If tournament “A”, is in your district and isn’t filled by the time you go in to choose your tournament selections, then you will be given your choice.
- More information about the overall process is posted here
- What is my team’s district? [and relatedly, can I move districts?]
- The team is assigned a district based solely on the team’s home city. District definitions are posted here.
- You can see your district from the Team List
- Teams can only move districts for qualifier tournament registration for 1 reason: The district that your team is in has no additional tournament space
- Is the FLL season done after the team attends a November qualifier tournament? [and relatedly, can my team attend more than 1 qualifier tournament]
- There are 4 types of FLL Events:
- Community / Scrimmage events – organized locally and may or may not follow regional and FLL rules/standards
- FLL Qualifier Tournaments (QT) – managed by FLL Partner in a region and required to follow regional and FLL rules/standards
- FLL Championship Tournaments (CT) – similar to QTs but teams must advance from QT based on FLL defined criteria and are generally larger events
- FLL Post-Season Festivals / Invitationals / Opens – similar or larger to CT but generally a lottery is held to determine which FLL regions are invited. In the best case, we would be able to send 1 team to at least 1 of these post-season events.
- So, if a team attends a QT and does not advance to a CT, their official FLL season is over. [Advancement from one level to the next one is defined in #2 in Judging FAQ]
- In NorCal, we “race” to find willing people to organize sufficient QTs to allow all teams exactly 1 slot at a tournament. There is zero opportunity for a team to participate in more than 1 QT. You can help – Quick guide
- There are 4 types of FLL Events:
- Our team is looking for… a mentor/scrimmage/challenge table?
- If your team is looking for a mentor, the best is to find a local FRC or FTC team and reach out to them.
- If your team is looking for a scrimmage, “open” scrimmages are rare events here in NorCal – most communities allow on their “local teams” to attend. The open scrimmages will get posted on this site under the Events area starting late in September. You can help – by organizing a scrimmage
- If your team is looking for a challenge table, there have been several posted here – looked under “Activity” or “Members“. We do not recommend portable/foldable or similar ones (like the “Stow and Go” one on the usfirst.org site) – it becomes unusable quickly other than for demos. It is not hard to build one – instructions here.
We invite you to join FLL Challenge Robotics competition scrimmage practice at Basis Fremont. We believe this will help your team gain match experience and prepare the Qualifier better.
Date : 10/26 1:30pm
Location : Basis Fremont (Lower School Campus)
To register :