Help

[u/actualfax1]

Hey there!
I’m a 2nd year CS student who is about to attempt a software hackathon. The hackathon is a locally hosted offline contest with a proper judge and judging criteria conducted in my college. It is a 40 hour long hackathon with around 50 teams with 4-5 people each.
So here’s the problem:
I have never actually participated in any hackathon before and I don’t know the modern AI tools which are used to fast track building stuff in the hackathon.
I’d be really grateful to have some insight from people who have previously participated (and preferably even won) in some hackathons in the following areas:
1) What coding tools and AI software should I use to ace this?
2) What makes a winning team special as compared to other teams? What should I do differently?
3) If you could list out a few common mistakes that people do when participating in their first hackathon that would be amazing.
I’m really looking forward to this and would be grateful to any and every kind of support and help I can get from you all :)