Some teams at my school have only 3 people, and this question crossed my mind. If one of the team members were unable to come to a competition, would a member of another team be allowed to be the loader? If not, what about someone who’s not a member of a team?
Rule G4. Point C.
c. Loaders are an exception to this rule. If a Team only has two Students and is unable to field a
three-Student Drive Team, they may choose from one of the following options:
i. For a given Match, they may substitute in a Student from their Alliance Partner’s Team as a
temporary Loader. They may do this in as many Matches as needed.
ii. For a given event, they may substitute in a Student from another Team to be their Loader for the duration of the event. This Student will effectively become a member of the new Team for that event, and cannot fill a role on the original Team (or on any other Teams) for the remainder of that event.
iii. There is no requirement for a Drive Team to have a Loader; if desired, they can play the Match with only two Drivers, and rely on their Alliance Partner’s Loader.
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This is addressed in Rule G4 of the game manual. Read the rule carefully and see if what you wish to do fits in the situation described by the rules.
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This has actually happened to me once or twice. There are two things you could do.
- Have another person from a different team, or someone who’s not on a team, like you said, be the loader. If the team they came from or the team are going to be a sub for has qualified for states or worlds, they cannot be the driver, just the loader. This is because of a rule about switching teams.
- Have a team member from your alliance partner’s team be a loader for only one match. This only works if your alliance partner’s teams have 4 or more people.
I have found that option 1 is easier and better to do, and if a team from your school or organization has a spare team member, they will probably let you borrow one for the day.
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Yes you could have someone who’s not a member of a team provided they got their student waiver signed, or you could also borrow loaders from a sister team.
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For loading, a member of another team is allowed to load. However, I believe that if they load for your team they cannot load again for their team, so you should find someone with multiple people on their team who can load, or if its their last match/qual
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