http://robotevents.com/vexawards/vexrwc.png
The dates for the 2011 VEX Robotics World Championship have been announced!
The event will be held April 28-30, 2011 at the Dallas Convention Center in Dallas, Texas.
More details are available in the update email that was sent out.
Just curious, was it considered at all that the FIRST Robotics World Championship would also be going on that weekend? I understand that we are dealing with two separate programs here but there is a lot of crossover in participants…
Guess I won’t be doing College Challenge this year… Anyone want my plans?
I would be interested to get inside your head despite being a high school student. Since PM is down you can email me at zac.temple@yahoo.com if you don’t mind sharing.
~DK
I am also curious what you were thinking of, I am also not in the college level, but would still be interested. If you wouldn’t mind, send me an email at [EMAIL=“LegoMindstormsmaniac@yahoo.com”]LegoMindstormsmaniac@yahoo.com
Thanks!
~Jordan
I’m curious too; but who would have thunk that when Vex moved one week further away from the FIRST Championship’s typical date (I think that it’s been mid-April for maybe 5 years or more) that instead of being farther away they would find FIRST’s Championship (in their new St Louis venue) smack on top of them.
My guess is that even though Vex only announced this today; that both organizations locked in a date before either announced their date.
Sigh,
Blake
im interested too but you should hold it of a bit so the public can brainstorm on their own 
email is murdomeek@hotmailDOTcom btw if you want to share
I was pretty much joking, guys. 
I’ll share a few ideas with you guys though, I’m always interested to see different takes on the same game.
I might still be going if my FRC team doesn’t make it, but that would be short notice…
I think this will impact any team that competes in FRC and VRC or FTC and VRC. Some members and mentors of the Twisted Botz are also part of FRC 122 NASA Knights. I would hate to have to decide between FRC (St. Louis) and VRC (Dallas) World Championships.
when will the world championship registering available?
and btw,when the new team rigistering on robotevents end?
OK, this may come off as rude, but…
“Chris is me,” you’ve been bragging about your master plan to rule the Vex college competition for the last month now. If you’d placed high in a previous year, or if you demonstrated a high understanding of CAD, physics, math or Vex in general then I wouldn’t be annoyed, but from what I can tell, you just joined the bandwagon.
The college competition is serious business, you don’t understand this until Massey dumps half a freaking field on you during autonomous making the rest of the match a complete joke. That was… wow, just wow.
You’d better have all guns blazin if you intend on placing in the college competition.
Ok…
_Cody
P.S. FIRST has been dropping their competitions on the same dates as Vex for the last two years (happened to our FTC regional a year ago). I don’t know which side picked the overlap this time.
My schedule consultant informs me that the Vex world championship date aligns with Texas public highschool dates for standardized tests or finals, and so many Texas public school students will not be allowed to cut class to attend Worlds.
Maybe it doesn’t affect Seniors as much though.
Now this is very intriguing. Not only will this affect the VEX teams, but the FIRST teams as well. I’m sure TX is well represented at all of these events.
The week of Palmetto Regional was the same week that our state was doing the Georgia High School Graduation test. With one of the tests on Thursday, and the make up day the following Friday, the Junior students (a group of about 4) had to finish testing, and ended up riding down together for the rest of the competition.
For anyone who does’t know, FRC Comps. are generally spread over three days, (TH, F, SAT), with TH being a practice day.
I don’t think if this was intentional, but I hope that both programs are getting over their egos and trying to work with each other in order to move around the dates since there is so much overlap.
Another question arises that what happens with the IFI staff that attend FIRST Championships? I know that many of them are major mentors in the major FRC teams (148, 217, 1114 right off the top of my head). I’m sure that these all-star teams might be able to handle it, but it’ll still be a loss for everyone who’s not competing with these awesome mentors.
All,
I will post a more formal response later this week, but I must clear one thing up immediately. The 2011 VEX World Championship date was selected almost two years ago. I am confident FIRST had no idea of this date just as we did not know their date. The selection of the 2011 VEX World Championship date was not intentionally set as the same weekend as the FIRST Championship.
Paul
I didn’t use this thread to brag. I put a joking comment in frustration of my inability to attend saying “anyone want my plans?”. Then like 7 people responded. I’d really prefer if people used this thread to discuss the Vex Championship and not my comment. Thanks.
As the person who negotiated the contract for the VEX World Championship in Dallas, I wanted to take a minute to answer some of the questions and address some incorrect assumptions that have been made regarding the 2011 VEX World Championship dates.
A three-year agreement securing the Dallas Convention Center and Arena for the VRC World Championship was reached in the summer of 2008 – covering the 2009, 2010 and 2011 VRC World Championships. We agreed to the three years in Dallas for a variety of reasons, including: we knew the facility could hold a very high quality event, it had the space to allow well over 300 teams to participate, it was a large city with a great transportation hub for teams and it had dates available that did not conflict with FRC at that time.
The date of the 2011 VRC World Championship was set almost three years ago. There were no other dates available (other than Easter weekend) and we knew that FIRST always scheduled their Championship in mid April. We contracted those dates (even though we would have preferred earlier dates) partially because we were trying to avoid conflicting with the FIRST Championship which we could only guesstimate would be scheduled the week or two before Easter in 2011.
As explained above, I can assure everyone with 100% certainty that neither organization was able to avoid this conflict. Our understanding is that FIRST would have preferred earlier dates in April but none were available in St. Louis, and our 2011 dates were set in stone almost three years ago. Both organizations know there are schools and teams that participate in both programs. As most know, we are very supportive of the FRC program and Championship. Many (in fact a majority) of those that work at VEX and with the Robotics Education and Competition Foundation support and mentor FRC teams in addition to VEX teams. Many of us attend both the VRC World Championship and the FRC Championship each year, and not being able to attend one in 2011 is going to be difficult for all of them. We know this does not impact a “majority” of the teams that would attend the championship of either program, and both will still fill their Championships and host wonderful events. But regardless, we know firsthand that it will impact some very passionate, dedicated and amazing teams and volunteers who participate and support both programs (including many of our staff).
Our plan and intention from the start of the 2009/2010 season was to announce the dates of the 2011 VRC World Championship when we unveiled the new game (Round Up) back in April. When FIRST announced their new Championship dates in St. Louis for 2011, we obviously knew at that time that they had secured the same dates we had already secured two years earlier. We then spent months working with Dallas and also with the other conventions/conferences already scheduled in the convention center in April to see if any could/would change dates with our event in 2011 – none could. We started a new search to see if any suitable facility in any other city would be available other weeks in April, willing to move the VRC World Championship to avoid the conflict – none were, but we continued to look. We postponed announcing the 2011 dates at the 2010 World Championship, still holding out hope that we might be able to find a way to reschedule it in Dallas or move it somewhere else. Once we had exhausted all possible avenues and knew there was no way to avoid the conflicting dates, we announced the dates to the public.
We (and FIRST) are both faced with a very difficult challenge to put on events of this size and scale in a very short time window of possible dates, while taking into account a variety of constraints, such as:
a. Schools have been very vocal over the years that they do NOT want the season to extend into May for a variety of reasons (Proms, state testing, finals – especially for the schools which end in May and so on)
b. With the huge network of over 200 VRC qualifying events, the World Championship can not be much earlier than April (as a temporary solution for 2011 we did look at dates in every city for March and even May, but still none were available).
c. Easter. The Easter holiday floats and changes dates each year – sometimes in late, mid or early April and even sometimes in March. Schools and families have been fairly unanimous when we have surveyed them that they would NOT want to attend events on Easter weekend (it is an important religious weekend for many, families travel, airfares are much more expensive, it would be difficult to send a team if key members/ teachers/ chaperones were unable to travel over Easter, etc…). This adds to the challenge faced by both VEX and FIRST and in some years limits the suitable choices to host an event to only 1 or 2 weeks (such as 2011).
Keep one thing in mind – VEX and FIRST are the two largest and most successful Robotics Competitions in the World. With both seasons ending towards the end of the typical school year in North America (April), it was not a matter of “if”, but a matter of “when” the Championships would eventually have conflicting dates due to the Easter holiday and the scarcity of facilities with open dates which can host events of this size. We had hoped to avoid such a conflict for as long as possible, and did everything in our power to do so, but in the case of 2011 Murphy enforced it’s Law and FIRST secured the same dates in St. Louis that VEX had already secured for Dallas.
Now that FIRST has secured their Championship dates in St. Louis for the next 3 years, we will certainly take those dates into account as we try to finalize our Championship dates for the next three years. We know some teams and volunteers will have a conflict in 2011, and we will work extremely hard to ensure that every team, participant and volunteer that attends the 2011 VRC World Championship will have an incredible experience they will remember for years to come.
I hope the information I’ve shared has helped clarify things and answer the questions many have asked. If I haven’t articulated anything clearly, or you have any additional questions, please let me know.
Best regards,
Jason Morrella
Jason,
Thanks for taking the time and trouble to provide that information. I do, however, have several questions:
Do you believe FIRST was aware of the dates Vex had contracted with the Dallas Convention Center when it negotiated with St. Louis?
If so, how?
If not, would it not have been better for all involved if Vex has announced the dates for the three years when the contract was agreed?
Even if Vex wished to keep the information from the general public, couldn’t a confidential disclosure to FIRST have avoided the conflict? Of course, this should work both ways. If each organization commits to three years of scheduling about a year ahead of the first of those years, but the three year periods are offset by a year, then each would know, while negotiating its next dates, what dates to avoid.
TIA,
Eric
Jason, thanks for the long and very complete post.
Eric, in the past it’s been common to only announce the dates a year in advance. FIRST in the past has held the information about their Championships very close, in some cases not announcing the date until 7 months before the event. It was only after a letter was sent to FIRST in September of 2009 by the “elder statesmen” FIRST mentors about transparency and advanced planning that FIRST announced the next three years of the dates.
I expect that as the new VEX Competition organization plans out their events that we will see the advanced plans. I for one am looking forward to hearing what venue they found that can hold a 1000 teams.
Actually, the Dallas Convention Center could. Let’s see, 22-24 competition fields, 25 practice fields, 25 Skills Challenge fields, 10-12 divisions, 300 volunteers, 6,000 students and mentors, and one Jason Morrella wondering “what did I get myself into?” Could be fun.