No, Poly limits ARE stupid because if you really dont want us to put that many polies into a model then leave it to the judges to downrate him for using too many polies... I am wholeheartedly against using too many polies when you DONT need them. But seeing as this is a COLOSSUS contest, you will need more polies to make a smooth edge, you dont want this to be a "make anything you want and scale it up" contest do you? otherwise all the entries will be blocky and look like shit. And no... im probably not going to make a 10 THOUSAND poly model.... i was joking. but even when i joke apparently poly-nazi rears its head and roars. :/ anywho id like to think we can trust the judges (whomever they may be) to make sound decisions regarding poly use. No superfluous polies, everything should be deliberate and carefully placed.
EDIT: for example. the model im making of a giant fighting robot currently has about 460 polies for 1 complete arm (full finger articulation, weapons etc.) so 1000 give or take for both arms roughly estimating another 1000 for both legs... needless to say it will definitely be under 10k.... maybe even optimistically under 7000