Our Tournament!!!

       Our team competed this past Sunday at the Marquette regional tournament. We did a great job and had a ton of fun. Unfortunately, our lead robot driver was unable to attend the tournament. To represent our missing team member we put a Lego mini figure on the front of the robot.

T.E.A.M. with mini Alex queued and ready to go for interviews

       After we set up or pit display, we had interviews. First, was the project interview which went great despite a few missing props. Thankfully, we were able to recover smoothly and finish the presentation. In the Q and A afterward the judges only had two questions and were able to dismiss us to our next interview early.

Our Pit!

Preparing for Interviews     

      While we were waiting for our next interview, we realized we had forgotten our laptop down at our pit table. After retrieving the laptop from the pits, our team was ready to go. We had one of the best robot design interviews we have had yet! All the team members from head programmers to skit writers had something great to add to the conversation. The programmers wowed the judges with how well they understood the robot code and their effective use of the gyro sensor.

Running the robot

At the practice tables

        After the robot interview, we just had our core values interview left. The teamwork exercise went great and the judges were impressed with how organized our team was. After a short Q and A the interviews were over and we just had robot matches left.

Sitting with other teams in the audience

The Robot Stage

       In our first robot match we scored 69 points and we were in 10th place. Afterward, we got some time on the practice tables and worked on some quick fixes to our programs. Then, we headed off to our second robot match. This time we scored 40 points and were in 22nd. After programming another quick mission to help us score a little higher we went back for our third robot match. The programs ran almost perfectly but our score was only 66 points. Afterward, we found out that one of the mission models had been built incorrectly and had undone a task. However, it was too late to do anything about it so we remained in 22nd place. A bit disappointed, we headed off to the award ceremony.

In the Pit

T.E.A.M. Huddle

       At the award ceremony our team won the Innovative Solution award which quickly restored our spirits! Though we didn't move on to sectionals we still had a ton of fun and, as always, we headed off for some ice cream to celebrate.

#4889 T.E.A.M. Dia-Get-It - Thumbs up!

See the rest of our tournament photos on our Picassa page.