Finally

After a whirlwind past couple days doing last minute preparations, the day was finally here when 3313 could go down to the Twin Cities for our Regional, 10,000 Lakes at Williams Arena. Everyone signed and filled out permission forms and FIRST Consent and Release Forms. We printed the Business Plan, other Judge Handouts, and social media information.

Ryan's dad, Kevin, dropped off the trailer right after school and the team furiously packed it up. We also loaded up the two Sprinter Vans. Bydlon drove one and Mr. Nelson was awesome enough to drive the other down for the team. After spending the past two days packing and organizing and arranging, the actual loading of the robot was fairly simple. Everything had a place and everything was in that place. The drive down was uneventful except there was lots of singing along in Bydlon's van.

We got to Williams Arena and unloaded all of our things. However, the team had a panic attack that we left our safety glasses at the shop or lost them because we could not find them. Turns out, they were in Mr. Nelson's van which had to park somewhere else and wait because the robot unloading area is very small. Otherwise, unloading all of our stuff was uneventful.

We proceeded to our hotel, Best Western Plus in Bloomington. The team checked in and got settled then headed over to the Mall of America which is right across the street. Everyone got their assorted food choices. After that, people split up in small groups to go to the hotel hot tub, walk around Best Buy, go to the Microsoft store and other random places. By the end of the night, most people were hanging out and playing Rock Band or sleeping.

BIG DAY TOMORROW! We have to set up our pit, then replace the wheels and put our new fancy wheels on. The rest of the day will be spent anxiously awaiting and sitting through inspection (scary) and testing our robot and practicing.

Holding Pattern

After showcasing at the District 206 Student Showcase last Thursday, the team’s goals have really changed to focus much more on our upcoming Regional Competition at Williams Arena on March 29-31. We have been working on a bunch of different preparation projects including the flag, the banner, hotels, van drivers, and raising up the robot cart. The other big excitement was that some of the team members were on the radio this morning!

Scouting Ahead

At one of the team's first meetings of the year, we all came together and decided on season goals. The big question: What did we want to accomplish this year? Some answers included:

• Make it to the elimination rounds of our Regional Competition(s)
• Go to two Regionals (Lake Superior and 10K Lakes)
• Recruit more team members (Have at least 15 people on the team)
• Expand our community awareness
• Compete in various awards (Entrepreneurship, Website, etc.)

We have worked really hard for almost 5 months straight now to complete all of those goals. Unfortunately, we did not fund-raise enough money to attend both the Lake Superior and 10K Lakes Regionals. It costs $5000 to register for one and an additional $4000 to attend another. We did not want to miss out on the opportunity to scout and research however. So the team attended the Lake Superior Regional as spectators. 

Days Like These Are Awesome

Saturday was a GREAT day! The team was able to test their robot in a real environment, they got some awesome help, and they had a ton of fun! Especially after the trouble we had on Friday, Saturday meant a lot. Check out YouTube videos of our performance!

Rebound Rumble

The wait is over!! It has been 4 months since our first robotics meeting of the year and we FINALLY learned what this year's game will be. It is called Rebound Rumble and, as you can guess, the game is based on basketball. More on that later...

In an unusual twist of fate, not much went wrong today. Our Kick-Off Event was at the U of M Twin Cities. Some of the team members met up at Perkins for breakfast together at 5 am. Everyone got to JHS by 6am and we left on time (!!!!!). Big shoutout to Allan's mom for driving a couple students down to the event. Really great of her to take the time to help out the team and allow everyone a chance to experience Kick-Off. THANK YOU! The drive down was uneventful. There was a little trouble finding a parking space for the behemoth of a Sprinter van (Bydlon told everyone that it was a tour of the U of M campus). Eventually we decided on using metered parking. The metered parking led to a funny story which included our team exchanging one dollar bills for stranger's quarters.

Mock up of Basketball Hoops

The team decided to attend the Post Kick-Off Event along with the video presentation so we watched the live stream with all of the teams participating in PoKo (picture 1 and 2). We live-tweeted the event so check out the side bar on this blog's main page or go to this link. The anticipation was incredible. The video was star-studded. Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Stephen Colbert, and Will.I.Am all made an appearance. Each, in their own way, acknowledged all the great things FIRST Robotics does for students, mentors, communities and our US culture as a whole. Colbert especially was really funny. Best line of his was "I have experience in robotics too. My toaster and Roomba battled to the death. Needless to say, my Roomba is now in charge of making my toast." Other parts of the presentation talked about the major sponsors (JC Penney and Coca-Cola) and last year's Chairman's Award winner from Hawaii. Dean Kamen, the head honcho of this crazy business, also did his "State of FIRST Robotics" speech.

Mock up of Balance Boards

It took about an hour but eventually we got to the juicy details. As already stated, the game is called Rebound Rumble. You can check out the video here. It really is worth a watch. In case you didn't watch it or are confused, the two basic tasks each robot needs to complete are shooting mini basketballs into hoops and then balancing on a board either by themselves or with other robots. Each of these tasks are similar to previous years. Basketballs were used in 2006 and the balance boards were used in 2001. This will make research and designing much easier.

Collaboration!

Post Kick-Off was a rewarding experience. The team was able to start talking through the design process and received a printed out rule book and Encyclopedia Robotica. Thanks GO FIRST! Along the way, the team had a bunch of laughs and build more camaraderie (including a Sprinter van dance party). All in all, it was a great day.

OMG ROBOTS!