Competition Guide - Before the Competition
- Announce the competition to the community.
Remember that many speedcubers do not check CubingUSA and speedcubing.com regularly, so it would be a good idea to also announce the competition to the speedsolvingrubikscube Yahoo! group, Speedsolving.com, and various other online groups. CubingUSA can also send a notification to people in your area about the competition. - Contact media organizations for additional publicity.
Many newspapers or local news stations may be interested in your event. Contact a large number of media groups to get the word out and a few may come to your event. - Setup the Excel worksheet (available from Ron Van Bruchem).
Make sure you (or somebody who will be available at the competition) is familiar with Microsoft Excel to setup the competition worksheet. You may want to add the names of anybody who preregistered and add the appropriate sheets for the events you will be holding. - Install the scramblers on your computer
You'll want the scramblers installed locally on the computer in case you need to generate extra scrambles and don't have a connection to the Internet. - Print registration and competition sheets.
You will need these sheets before and during the competition, so do not wait until the last minute to print them. Example ones can be found in the What You Need section. If you have carbon-copy competition sheets, you may want to fill those out when people pre-register, so you're not filling out a ton the night before the competition. - Obtain prizes for the winners.
The WCA regulations state that winners should receive a prize for winning. At a minimum you should offer certificates, but trophies, puzzles, stickers, tiles, or other prizes would be ideal. - Print the scrambles ahead of time.
The scrambles are important, so they should be printed early and placed in a sealed envelope. You may have to generate the scrambles yourself using the scramblers on the WCA page, or they may be sent to you. Either way, this should be taken care of early enough to avoid the possibility of a competition without scrambles. - Become very familiar with the WCA regulations.
The WCA delegate will know the rules, but as the organizer, you should also become very familiar with the rules also. You don't want to have the WCA delegate to stop something because it's not following the regulations.
Next: At the Competition