Re: Inspirational teams
 

I made a quick post before but I think I am going to make a longer one talking about all the teams who have inspired me.

In 2014 my rookie year I did not know much about FRC and for lack of better words we were terrible.

Our robot was a mess but at the time I just thought everyone's robots were a mess. That was until I showed up at our regional. Our pit neighbor was team 3940 Cybertooth and I saw this beautiful purple powder coated robot. I was like woah they are good. I had no idea how they did in the competition all I knew was their robot looked really professional. Ironically because of luck we seeded higher then them which to me made me think we beat them. I have a good laugh at that now.

4039 was also at that event and really showed me how crazy people get about team image. I did not realize how good their robot was at the time but man those people liked their rainbow.

Later that season after the event I saw team 254s reveal video and was amazed. I have watched that video more time then I care to admit. I then looked back at their 2013 "reveal" video and was amazed once again. I then ventured on to youtube. Where I watched every single 118 reveal I could find and was again amazed at what people did in FRC.

Through the summer of 2014 I did a lot of watching and started reading stuff here. Now adays a few other teams that inspire me are probably 1678, 359, 195, 610, 27, 2056, 148, 179, 67 and 1241.

Re: Inspirational teams
 

There are many teams that have inspired me over the years.

Team 701 has been a HUGE inspiration of mine since my freshman year. They consistently produce top notch robots with elegant design features; have a wonderful team camaraderie that extends to people outside their team; and have inspired countless students from their communities, to China, to pursue higher educations in STEM.

Team 1678 has a similar story. They always provide a helping hand to local teams, putting on many dozens of workshops and events (VEX, FRC & FLL). Citrus Circuits have helped local teams attain success not thought possible, and my team was certainly no exception. I've spent a lot of time with their students and mentors, and their teams success is a reflection of their students and mentors work ethic and attitude. A truly world class team.

Team 1671 is another phenomenal team that immediately comes to mind. Those students work HARD and make amazing bots. I've visited their shop at all times of year and they are always busting butt! The Bird Brains always maintain a high standard of achievement and gracious professionalism.

There are many other exceptional teams that have inspired me over the years worth mentioning:
2073, 3250, 100, 3189, 692, 971 and 254 to name a few.

Thank you all for all you do for the FIRST community here in Cali!

Re: Inspirational teams
 

As others have mentioned team 2052 KnightKrawler is one of the top teams on my list of inspirational teams. At the beginning of build season I always ask myself how can my team compete with KnightKrawler. I hope that my team can eventually get to Champs with enough consistency that I can start asking myself how I'm going to beat the 1114's, 1678's, and 254's of the world, but at least for now they'll have to inspire me from afar.

On the Chairman's side of things I'm most inspired by 1816 and by the program they've established. I consider them to be the team to beat at any competition they attend. I'm pulling for them every year to get into the Hall of Fame.

Another team that inspires me to a great degree is GOFIRST at the University of Minnesota. Obviously not an FRC team, but they are a team of college students comprised primarily of FRC alumni. They've inspired me in many ways, and definitely changed my path at college.

Re: Inspirational teams
 

1323 for me. I've been able to see RC transform that team from 2007 onwards and they continue to impress me with how "unique" they are. Still one of my favorite teams in FRC.

Re: Inspirational teams
 

For myself, I would say teams 67 and 469, specifically in 2010. I attended the 2010 Detroit district, and 67 was the first team I ever saw in action, and I was just amazed by their robot. Then, I attended the Michigan State Championship with team 3175 because they qualified, and they told me to watch out for 469 cause they had a crazy robot. They were right, and I made sure to watch every match possible that 469 was in because I thought they were so cool. 3175 didn't qualify for Atlanta that year, but I was cheering from home to see the two teams make it to the Einstein finals, and having seen them in person, it really got me excited to join the team in 2013.

Re: Inspirational teams
 

25, 341, 1218, and 2590 were local sources of inspiration for us as we grew our program. Especially 341 -- Daisy's 2012 robot is referenced in some way every year as we design the current year's robot

Re: Inspirational teams
 

Team 67's 2012 robot is the robot that inspired me to step up my game. It was such an elegant machine, with no feature that felt unnecessary or wasted.
And really those are the robots that inspire me the most. The robots where every actuation and movement has a purpose, and the robot is as simple as possible to do what the team wants it to do.
1678 is another great example. Their robots the past four years have been so intelligently designed.
225 is an excellent example as well, and anyone who has seen their 2013 robot knows that they didn't start off with crazy resources.

Re: Inspirational teams
 

In addition to 1816, I believe 2220 is also the team to beat at any competition Chairman's, Engineering Inspiration, or simply award wise in MN and in FRC- winning chairman's at Central Illinois against stellar Illinois teams was impressive.

Blue Twilight has been an inspiration to me winning the awards they win on a consistent basis- their outreach program is truly established and really impressive. 2220 has just as good as a shot as 1816 into getting into HOF IMO.

Re: Inspirational teams
 

I find 1241, 1477, and 610 to be inspirational because of their against-the-odds championship win. Also, all three of them are very friendly and I've enjoyed seeing how they play the game. 610 puts out some of the most polished and well-made reveal videos of the entire FRC world. 1241 and 1477 build very unique and recognizable robots, and they're usually some of the first robots I recognize.

Re: Inspirational teams
 

After 17 seasons in FIRST, I wanted to mention several teams from our earlier years that provided inspiration with respect to their overall program (engineering, outreach, and program management).

If I forget some off the top of my head, sorry in advance. These are just the teams that I had contact with and/or saw personally while at regional competitions and the Championships early on.
16, 25, 33, 45, 60, 64 (no longer around), 67, 71, 103, 111, 118, 148, 217, 233, 254, 330, 341, 365, 368, 469, 842, 987, and 1114.
All of these teams were awesome from the beginnings of their respective program. We marveled at their engineering feats as well as the non-robot aspects of their programs.

This would be difficult to do today or in recent years simply because their are just too many to mention.
A rule of thumb for me personally is taking away something new, neat or creative of the participating robots from every tournament we attend and from the teams that we meet.
Our program is where it is today, because we always learned from the best and tried to emulate in some form or fashion what they have done. Being from Hawaii has many disadvantages.....but having the opportunity to participate in so many different regional competitions has definitely helped us overcome the challenges.

Re: Inspirational teams
 

I'll throw 111 into the mix. I remember being amazed every year at their robots in the mid-2000s (when I was in high school). Some of the most complecated designs I had seen and they worked. Check out their drivebase in 2004 to be amazed. Also, everyone wanted a Wildstang safety glasses band (unfortunately I never got one).

Re: Inspirational teams
 

330 has been and will likely continue to be a very inspirational team for me. They are very clever at building awesome robots with very simple construction techniques and tools. They also understand the importance of branding and work that into their imagery. Other than 2009, you can look at a 330 robot and without any numbers, tell it is a 330 robot based off of color scheme and fabrication techniques.

Also, there are few moves during a competition that will get a crowd fired up than a robot falling over, and then self-righting and taking the win. While several teams have done this over the course of their history, 330 has likely more of these tales to tell than any other team.

For Michigan, I would compare 2054 to 330 for similar build techniques, and cleverness that works very well, and clear theme.

Some other teams that I find inspirational:
2337 for not only building cool robots, but for community impact. Their rookie workshop is incredibly well run and incredibly impressive. Many more senior mentors attend to get some great insights on the game each year.

27 has been mentioned elsewhere, so I will reference 503 for incredible impact via chairman's initiatives as well as their huge impact towards Michigan's FTC program.

There are several other Michigan team's I could mention, but to be fair, if you just look at the CA winners of the districts, you nearly have a complete list of teams that inspire me here. With so many events, we award so many District Chairman's awards that a lot of teams have really stepped up their efforts the last several years. With the award now going to 1 in 20 teams, some might argue it has made it less special, but by putting the bar within reach, I see a lot more teams making a grab for it.

Re: Inspirational teams
 

As an outreach model, 4499 sets a very high standard for Colorado. They're only four years old, but in that time they've won two RAS Awards, two EI Awards, and two consecutive Regional Chairman's Awards.

Re: Inspirational teams
 

As for teams I've had the ability to actually talk to and work with, I'm going to give it to 20. They've been around since the very start and they always end the regional strong, even if they have a rocky start. It's become a bit of a pattern on having 20 put up a less-than-top-ten performance on day 1 and then come back win the entire regional (or at least be a finalist) as an alliance captain over the last few years. Very smart and hard-working set of people that are always helping out other teams.

Re: Inspirational teams
 

I agree with all of these, but especially 341 and 2590.

My first competition was the 2012 Springside-Chestnut Hill District Event, where 341 was in attendance. For anyone unfamiliar with Miss Daisy in 2012, they attended two district events, the Boston regional, MAR Champs, and Curie. They seeded first at all of them and went undefeated in elimination matches until Curie Finals. Their fast, crazy-accurate bot was one of the first FRC robots I had ever seen. It that made me think, "wow, someday I want to help make something that amazing." Five seasons later, they were also pretty great to be on an alliance with. In addition to building cool robots, 341 is one of the nicest teams out there.

My first especially memorable encounter with 2590 was at the 2014 MAR Championship. By some miracle, after winning our first event as the second-to-last pick (after only being picked once in all our previous years) and going unpicked at our second, we managed to seed second. We had no prior scouting experience because we were never in a position to pick (a bad reason not to scout, since scouting data helps win quals, but that's beside the point), so we made a hectic attempt to scout and prepare for alliance selection. In quarterfinals, the #7 alliance of 2590, 11, and 341 beat us in two and went on to win the event. I was amazed that they were able to put together such a powerful alliance from the #7 spot. It showed me the awesome power of scouting and inspired me to spearhead new scouting ventures on 1257. Before MAR Champs 2014, I was far from the most motivated member of 1257, but with scouting and strategy I had finally found my niche.

I'd also like to mention a few other amazing teams from MAR.

1626 has helped us so much over the years, both at competitions and build/off-season mentorship. They were the first to really believe in us. Their assistance in fixing our robot was the reason we had a operational, competition-legal robot at the 2011 NYC Regional after our students had misunderstood some key robot rules. The next year, 1257's lead mentor retired after the 2011 season and our wonderful current lead mentor stepped up to the role with only one year of FRC experience (one of two returning mentors). They provided us with much-needed direction and guidance that we didn't really have with our lack of experience. Fast-forward to 2014: they were the second team to ever pick us, inviting us join their alliance at a district event, which we won. It was a really inspiring event for many on the team, myself included, who had never experienced any success at competition beyond one quarterfinals appearance. They are not only a major reason 1257 still exists but also big lesson to us about what coopertition (as cheesy as it may sound sometimes) is really about: helping others so we can all take away more from this wonderful program.

225 is certainly on my list. What inspires me most about TechFire is their impressive rise to success and how much their history resembles 1257, but shifted a few years earlier. The team disbanded and re-formed a few years later under new leadership, and after a few rough years, gradually upped their game from going unpicked at both events in 2011 to winning a few events and consistently making elims/captaining alliances (around where 1257 is now) to triple-banner seasons in 2015 and 2016. They've taken to building some of my favorite robots to watch in action. Their 2016 robot includes a sophisticated auto-aiming arm and their 2015 bot grabs totes two-at-a-time from the landfill and builds stacks by piling them up on the scoring platform. They're also a pleasure to be on an alliance with, as they're quite a nice team.