[gsteller]

What a fantastic weekend!

Admittedly, FRC 3780 was not at all expecting to be making eliminations when we first walked into Agganis Arena on Thursday. Our team has definitely had our ups and downs in the past years, and because our mentor lives in New Hampshire, Oliver Graff and myself have had to step up to the plate as co-captains in order to ensure that our team has moved in the right direction. So, it would be accurate to say that this year's regional introduced us to many unfamiliar aspects of FRC competition.

Nonetheless, it would additionally be accurate to say that many of those unfamiliar aspects made for an outstanding experience. Our favorable match-ups in the qualification round landed us in eliminations as the #5 seeded alliance, and although we didn't begin our scouting until a couple hours before eliminations, we were ecstatic to end up with teams 229 and 1153. BIG shout outs to teams 125 and 1511 for being incredibly helpful in quickly teaching us the basics in how to approach our scouting strategy. After 229 accepted our offer in a grateful (gracious) manner, we both were crossing our fingers that 1153 would remain available come our second pick. Working with both of your teams was the highlight of our week. You both have incredible talent, and we hope that you enjoyed being a part of the same alliance as much as we did. Additionally, you both were fantastic in how flexible you were with our "budget bot". Both of your teams, without complaint, were phenomenal in quickly working on and fixing up our bot before each match, whether it was a quick battery mount solution, or toying with the drive train. Thank you for being so graciously professional. I can speak for the entire team in saying that your support was inspiring and essential.

I also wanted to personally thank everyone for tolerating my flamboyant unicorn costume. It was interesting, to say the least, to witness some of your reactions, all of which were greatly appreciated. Thank you to the entire event staff, Boston University, all of the mentors, all of the sponsors, and everyone who made the event possible. We hope you all enjoyed the "super sparkly rainbow $wag", and hope to see you all soon at the event next year!