Sorry for taking so long to get a post-ARML email out to you. We ARML
coaches always tell each other in April and May that "there'll be
plenty of time to sleep when ARML's over"; well, I'm almost caught up.
:) It's a lot of hard work each year, but it's all worth it to see all
of you enjoy the best extracurricular activity out there..
Wow. What an ARML. I hope you had as much fun as I did. I wish I had
more opportunity to hang out with you all this year, but one of the
realities of having six teams it's that I had to spend a lot more time
on administrative details this year. Basically we had two coaches in
charge of each 15 student team and then Jeff and I had to coordinate a
team of almost 15 coaches. We all made it work though, and I want to
thank you all for making sure nothing happened to give me and Jeff a
heart attack.. :)
Okay, so many people to give a shout out to: first of all, thanks so
much to Jeff, Silas, Moor, and Linda for taking on so much
responsibility and making sure everything ran so smoothly. Next,
thanks to all the Stanford students who helped run practices and made
sure all of you got where you needed to go this weekend. Also thank
you to the parents who did whatever we asked and provided vital
support for our teams. Finally, thank you all for coming to ARML, and
a special thanks to all our team captains as well..
So what happened at ARML this year and why am I so happy with all of
you? Well, first off A1 placed sixth. That's awesome! I'm sure you
hoped for better (didn't we all?), but I am totally pleased with this
result. With a 15-point spread among the top six teams, it was really
anyone's game. Any given Sunday, right? Sure, the team round took its
toll on A1, but I am very proud of your performance despite the
difficulty on the team test. And you totally made up some ground in
the later rounds; in fact, you were the third best team in terms of
individual round scoring, and you were the top relay team in the
country! Way to go!
As for A3-A5 teams, you did an awesome job, and for the first time
ever we have a group that is required to have five teams in the A
division. A6 did quite nicely as well, posting a very respectable
score for a B team. Brilliant job, and I am very proud of all of you.
The teams were very close in terms of overall score, which is great;
Silas and I are talking about having a contest next year among these
teams so you all can push each other to even higher scores...
The big story of course is the A2 team. BEST. A2 TEAM. EVER. I had
jmerry on aops check the stats and, relative to the number of teams
competing, we posted the best showing ever for a second team. In fact,
A2 was ahead of A1 until the final round of individual questions and
was ahead of SoCal A1 until the final relay! This is an absolutely
amazing result, and you all are to be congratulated! I think it is now
clear that SFBA has the potential to have two teams each year
thatplace nationally, and I look forward to the day when that
happens..
Of course, let's not forget our individual high scorers; we had a huge
number of students in the tiebreakers and several students in the top
20, and Lewis Chen was 5th place overall. Congratulations to all of
you!
Okay, so you all did a great job this year, but we still have some
work to do. We are not the only group in the country that is required
to have 5 A teams; New York continues to keep pace with us in terms of
depth, and although no other teams in the country are even close, New
York is basically even with us deep into our lineup. This is an area
where I think our A3-Ainfinity teams can make some real inroads. At
the top of the standings, there is always the "what if" game - if A1
and A2 had traded team rounds, A1 would have been 2nd; and of course
if A2 had been able to swap relays with A1 it would have been 6th.
However, if San Diego had been able to swap its A1 and A2 relay
scores, it would have been 2nd. San Diego is the real team to watch
out for on the West Coast, so we can't get too comfortable moving
forward..
There is also more work to be done in terms of team selection. I think
the process has continued to improve, but there are always things we
can do to make the system better. Obviously any post-contest
observation about how someone from An outscored someone from A1 on the
individual round fails to account for the natural statistical noise in
this sort of competition (or for the impact individuals have on the
team rounds), but I certainly want to take an objective look at the
process and see what we can do to improve things for next year. I
understand there are two primary schools of thought here: those of you
who would like to let the teams choose themselves and those who prefer
an objective system. I like both ideas and would love to find a way to
please everyone. Just know that I and the rest of the coaches will be
working hard (incorporating your feedback throughout the process) to
continue to make the system the best it can be, and that the only
thing I can promise you is that not everyone will be 100% satisfied.
:) As always, we are interested in hearing your suggestions for how to
improve the ARML experience, so please send me any suggestions you
have about team selection or anything else..
A couple of financial notes - First, if you need to be reimbursed for
any ARML expenses (this will mostly apply to coaches and to the
students who flew to Las Vegas), please send an email to let me know.
I am hoping to get all the finances for ARML squared away by the end
of the month. Next, ARML raised fees this year on us, but I kept your
cost the same so I'm pretty sure the trip ended up costing more than
we brought in this year. As this is obviously not sustainable, we will
likely have to increase fees around 10% next year. Please note that we
are always interested in attracting sponsors, so if any of your
parents work at companies that may be interested in sponsoring our
ARML team, I would love to pursue all such options in the interest of
keeping your costs low..
Thanks again to all of you for making this the best year ever for SFBA
ARML. Let's make it even better next year!
-Tim
BTW I have a little interesting information to share with you:
http://myweb.stedwards.edu/edwarde/ARML.html
Apparently Jeff was more awesome than all of us when he was at ARML.
Now I know what you're thinking: "ARML was much smaller back then;
that's like comparing Doyle Brunson to Chris Moneymaker". Yes, yes it
is, and Jeff is still awesome. Also note for a bit of historical fun
that Texas Silver achieved its peak performance when I left that team
in the mid-90s, and then Texas Gold did the same.. :)
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