[reledi]

I've represented my university in the ACM-ICPC four times in a row and this year I coached. I consider myself average at competitive coding (i.e. if I had a team that consisted of my clones, we would not be good enough to make top 30 in a difficult region). I participate to learn (both algorithms and coding) and because I enjoy it. A side benefit is that I'm a quicker problem solver than when I started.

Every year I try to recruit students. The most common reply is along the lines of "I'm not good enough". To which I reply "You compete to learn, you'll get better!". Doesn't work though, the best strategy is to have an authority figure (e.g. professor) ask students to compete.

edit: This collection of resources I put together may be of interest to some. https://github.com/BrockCSC/acm-icpc/wiki