Oh wow. It has been quite a while since I updated this blog! As I type the off-season is underway and the team is bringing around the robot to demonstrate at various places. But that is another post. To start off, I'll try and recall the Peachtree Regional...
Going to Peachtree for the second year as the Flying Platypi was much different than the first because of one big factor: teams knew about us. Getting our team's name out there was not an uphill battle and even in the first few minutes I was in the competition building, I saw other teams point us out and make comments about my team. (Hopefully good comments!) But, even better than knowing that our team was recognized was the feeling of walking into the stands to see the field for the first time.
Back in our pit, the team was busy. The pit needed to be assembled and the robot needed to be completed:
The next two days went by in a blur. Talking to teams, scouting, getting the robot through inspection, and dealing with disappointment as our robot ran into problems again, and again. But, despite the problems, my team had a blast helped, in part, by the debut of our mascot. Yesiree, Gary the platypus certainly made an impression.
By the the end of qualifiers, our robot was ranked in the upper thirties and the chances were that we would not be picked for the elimination rounds. Standing in the line, I just about screamed in excitement when team #281 EntTech picked us to be a part of the 8th seed alliance. The group was completed by the wonderfully designed robot from the Gear Devils. In spite of the fact we were knocked out in the quarterfinals, we were proud of our performance. But, the biggest surprise of the tournament came at the end. During the competition, a lot of judges came to talk to our team, and many of them returned to check up on how our robot was doing. (One of the coolest judges was a guy named Morrison who had a scottish(?) accent!) The number of judges talking to us made one wonder...
Later, our team was sitting during the award ceremony when the Judges Award was announced. As the announcer was reading about the team who won, he dropped several hints which made all of us look at each other in shock. He that the team used lego models to help develop the robot concept and the articulated drive system made climbing the bumps as "easy as pi". The team was us! We came home from Peachtree with a shiny, but pointy, Judges Award!
Amazing first regional.
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