It's more fun and less stressful with a team; at least if they're people you enjoy spending time and solving problems with. FWIW, I had the same experience as

It's more fun and less stressful with a team; at least if they're people you enjoy spending time and solving problems with. FWIW, I had the same experience as you with this contest last year, doing it solo, although in general I find the ICFP contest way more fun than more typical programming competitions I did when I was younger (IOI-related and ACM contests). Pacing is always a challenge. My own takeaway from the last few ICFP contests has been that ICFP encourages careful pacing by the gradual delivery of changes to the problem. If you put all your work in at the beginning, you might win the lightning round, but there's a good chance you won't have the energy to cope with the final twists. Or so I believe anyway. We'll have to see how this one goes.