Hello Karthik,
Does <G3> include Skills Challenges? To clarify, can a team have a different coach/driver for a Skills Challenge than they use in regular match play?
Rule <G3> (Quoted below) states that a Drive Team Member can play for only one team at an event, however, the definition of Drive Team Member explicitly states that a Drive Team Member is any of the team in the Alliance Station during a Match and does not mention the Skills Challenges in any way.
Additionally, in this thread Answered: Intention of <G3> - VRC > Skyrise (14/15) - VEX Forum, you said the intent was “to help eliminate any potential perceived or real conflicts of interest that occur when one person acts in this role for more than one team.”
Obviously, as the Skills Challenges are solo events, any conflict of interest where two teams that had been using the same coach played against each other is impossible. Although it’s original purpose isn’t applicable, it’s effects can still cause minor issues.
If a team with an Adult Coach (can’t load Skyrise Sections) wants to keep up with other strong teams in the skills rankings, they can’t be taking their hands off the controllers every few seconds to load a Section. For a Skills run they could borrow a student driver/coach from another team to help them load their Sections so they’re not at a disadvantage. As we’ve seen countless times in the past, every second counts in Skills.
Additionally, many events allow teams to run Skills runs the day before the actual competition matches begin. If a crucial team member was unable to attend one of those days, another could fill in for him. For example, Coach 1 can’t make the night before for Skills but is still going to coach matches the next day, so another coach from another team helps load the Sections on the Skills runs the night before.
It may seem like a small and insignificant ruling, but it can make a big difference.
Thanks!
PS. Sorry for such a long post, I wanted to make sure I was very clear and there were no misunderstandings 