Frequently Asked Questions About WCA Competitions

[PBCubing]

How old do you have to be to host a competition? My son is 13 and wants to host one but I think he is getting ahead of himself.

 

[Ranzha]

Hi All!!!
So there ARNET many competitions on the West Coast, and I want to maybe be able to host one instead. Any way I can do that and have the official scores on the official WCA Website? So basically an official competition. Who would I need to speak with, and how much average it would cost
Thanks!!!
-Riley

Rose City was just one month ago. The Bay Area competitions are about 9 hours drive from you, and we had one this past weekend and one the week prior. Not to mention the Vancouver competitions.

I'd suggest being patient or offering to help with organisational responsibilities for another Portland competition. Oregon has always been underrepresented, and it would be good to have more competitions in that area, but to say the entire West Coast doesn't hold many competitions is outright false. In fact, the first two WCA-recognised competitions hosted in America ever were at Caltech.

 

[Deleted member 19792]

@CuberRiley


Costs really depend on your location, the delegates location (in the case that you need to fly the delegate out), timer rentals, venue rentals, and WCA giveback fees. Try to calculate your budget and then see what you can do from there with registration fees.

 

[Chree]

Rose City was just one month ago. The Bay Area competitions are about 9 hours drive from you, and we had one this past weekend and one the week prior. Not to mention the Vancouver competitions.

I'd suggest being patient or offering to help with organisational responsibilities for another Portland competition. Oregon has always been underrepresented, and it would be good to have more competitions in that area, but to say the entire West Coast doesn't hold many competitions is outright false. In fact, the first two WCA-recognised competitions hosted in America ever were at Caltech.

Rose City 2015 was a bit of an eye opener. When I started organizing it, I looked at the turnout for all of the past surrounding competitions in Oregon, Washington, Vancouver BC, and Northern California. From that, I expected about 30 competitors to show up... 50 tops. And that was the expectation given to the venue.

When the attendance shot over 100 in the weeks leading up to the competition and we were forced to close registration (or risk violating Portland Fire Codes), it was clear that Portland had an untapped demand for competitions. Zheng Li, the NW delegate in Seattle, WA, and I have begun discussing plans for the next comp, as well as seeking out venues that might be able to hold higher numbers.

The biggest issue with that would be adequate staffing. Competitions are getting huge lately. I think most organizers would agree that the growth in the community over the last year has been crazy. That also winds up meaning a lot more work involved.

@Riley - You can contact Zheng if you're interested in organizing another comp. He'd be happy to give you some pointers on getting started. I should warn you that it's a LOT of work and responsibility, especially if you expect a turnout like Rose City had. I should also let you know that we're already working on on another comp, possibly in late summer, and I'd be happy to have you on as staff.

 

[Myachii]

Is there any age limit to hosting a competition?

I'm turning 16 in June, and I may host a competition in Birmingham (UK) if I have the time/money in the next two years whilst I'm at college.

 

[shadowkiller168]

Is there any age limit to hosting a competition?

I'm turning 16 in June, and I may host a competition in Birmingham (UK) if I have the time/money in the next two years whilst I'm at college.

I'm 15 and I organized Lawrence Open 2014, and am organizing Lawrence Spring 2015. As long as you can actually do the work and take the initiative needed to organize a competition, age shouldn't matter.

In other words, you should be fine.

 

[Ranzha]

Rose City 2015 was a bit of an eye opener. When I started organizing it, I looked at the turnout for all of the past surrounding competitions in Oregon, Washington, Vancouver BC, and Northern California. From that, I expected about 30 competitors to show up... 50 tops. And that was the expectation given to the venue.

When the attendance shot over 100 in the weeks leading up to the competition and we were forced to close registration (or risk violating Portland Fire Codes), it was clear that Portland had an untapped demand for competitions. Zheng Li, the NW delegate in Seattle, WA, and I have begun discussing plans for the next comp, as well as seeking out venues that might be able to hold higher numbers.

The biggest issue with that would be adequate staffing. Competitions are getting huge lately. I think most organizers would agree that the growth in the community over the last year has been crazy. That also winds up meaning a lot more work involved.

@Riley - You can contact Zheng if you're interested in organizing another comp. He'd be happy to give you some pointers on getting started. I should warn you that it's a LOT of work and responsibility, especially if you expect a turnout like Rose City had. I should also let you know that we're already working on on another comp, possibly in late summer, and I'd be happy to have you on as staff.

If you host it, they will come.
I honestly never expected BASC 5 to get anywhere near 150 competitors registered. Boy was I wrong.
Also, there are whisperings that Portland cubers may be in luck in the near future. (Stay tuned!)

Staffing is always an issue. I haven't seen how other places do it, but for BASC competitions, we want our staff members to be efficient, and this usually means that we don't put first-time competitors or competitors who are young into such positions of responsibility. (We have enough issues with knowledgeable staff members, tyvm.) After some more competitions, it'll start becoming clear who locals/regulars are to Portland competitions, and then it will be easy to assemble an organisation team to split the work, because it's honestly a ton of work. If BASC can help in any way, let us know.

 

[Chree]

If you host it, they will come.
I honestly never expected BASC 5 to get anywhere near 150 competitors registered. Boy was I wrong.
Also, there are whisperings that Portland cubers may be in luck in the near future. (Stay tuned!)

Staffing is always an issue. I haven't seen how other places do it, but for BASC competitions, we want our staff members to be efficient, and this usually means that we don't put first-time competitors or competitors who are young into such positions of responsibility. (We have enough issues with knowledgeable staff members, tyvm.) After some more competitions, it'll start becoming clear who locals/regulars are to Portland competitions, and then it will be easy to assemble an organisation team to split the work, because it's honestly a ton of work. If BASC can help in any way, let us know.

Now you got me all curious!

What I did for Rose City was to recruit all of my non-cuber friends in the area to help out as judges/runners, and then try to rely on the experienced competitors for everything else. I knew a bunch of them from the WA and BC comps, so I knew we'd make it work. We also doubled the number of timers from usual in the NW, from 6 to 12, so that helped out a lot.

If we went bigger: more timers, more dedicated judges, clearer paths for runners, and a larger (and way more organized) scrambling station will all be an absolute must.

 

[Chree]

Has anyone worked out a really good system for keeping scrambling stations organized? I'd be interested to see what kinds of setups seem to work best at keeping everything organized and running smoothly.

 

[biscuit]

Hey chree how did you get sponsored by C4S for Portland comp? You think they may be open for others (or was it just because it was close to them?) I ask because that because C4S is awesome so promoting them is awesome and getting a sponsor (even if they only provide prizes) would seem to be very helpful

 

[Chree]

Hey chree how did you get sponsored by C4S for Portland comp? You think they may be open for others (or was it just because it was close to them?) I ask because that because C4S is awesome so promoting them is awesome and getting a sponsor (even if they only provide prizes) would seem to be very helpful

They were great to work with. You could probably contact Jason and Ken to see if they'd be interested in sponsoring another comp. I'm sure they'd consider it. I'd say make a post on their Shop thread or PM them.

 

[Jgldrums]

I still don't get how you get a WCA Profile/ID. Can someone explain this in depth for me?

 

[Cale S]

I still don't get how you get a WCA Profile/ID. Can someone explain this in depth for me?

Go to an official competition and you automatically get one

Here is the list of upcoming competitions:
https://www.worldcubeassociation.org/results/competitions.php

 

[Jgldrums]

Let's say a competition starts at 8:00 am. How early should you arrive?

 

[PenguinsDontFly]

Let's say a competition starts at 8:00 am. How early should you arrive?

that depends on whether 8 is when registration or the first event starts. when the schedule is released, check when registration is and when the first event starts. you want to arrive sometime in the registration time period. example: if registration is 8-9 and 2x2 starts at 9, be there any time before 9.

 

[Fazza2602]

in competitions, do your cubes need a logo?

 

[MoyuFTW]

in competitions, do your cubes need a logo?

Nooo Not necessary at all.

 

[Fazza2602]

sweet, thanks MoyuFTW

 

[Dene]

in competitions, do your cubes need a logo?

For all the regulations on logos, see here.

 

[Fazza2602]

thx dene, so those few regs are just saying you dont have to have one but if you do, it must be like this.