[CLandrum3081]

3081 has had their share of disappointments.

2012: MN Land of 10K Lakes Champions with 525 and 3747.
2013: Last place in Northern Lights.

You heard me. Last place. Not finalists, semifinalists, quarterfinalists, or just not picked in alliance selections.

That hurt. As one of the three captains, I blamed myself. Some blamed themselves or, worse, other people. Rookies were confused because they joined when they heard of the team's success. The school, which honestly hadn't even begun recognizing us until after MN Senator Al Franken visited (months after the regional win...), treated us as the district's best-kept secret again.

We did better at 2013 10K Lakes. Our highest rank was 13th. We finished in the mid-20s. Were we picked? No. But we did better.

To me, the three most important things to remember when dealing with disappointment are:

1. One student does not a whole team make. One captain can try to lead the team, and the other 10, 20, 30, 40+ students can be unresponsive. Likewise, a team's success can not be attributed to one person who worked really hard. If the team is successful, it's not the fault of the one or two slacker kids who didn't do anything. Did they play a part? Yeah. But so did everyone else. You win and lose as a team.

2. Celebrate every success. Celebrate every match won. Every point scored. At Northern Lights, we celebrated every time our robot moved! And we really celebrated when our friends 525 won the regional (and 10K a few weeks later. Moral of the story: 525 is beast). Should winning a match be put on the same level as winning a regional or making it to eliminations? No. That would be failure to accept reality. But the small successes should still be celebrated.

3. Chalk it up to experience. Oftentimes, when something doesn't work, you can pinpoint why right away: "Well, that's the last time we wait until week 4 to do this part." "Well, we're certainly coming up with a new design process last year." "All the problems were programming/electrical/mechanical/etc this year. Let's spend more time on it next year." "Let's finish the robot earlier so we can have drive practice." If you don't correct issues because they don't affect you negatively until the absolute worst minute (which - come on, it's robotics, of course that's how it's going to happen), you don't learn until you have to learn the hard way.

And sometimes, it's about luck. In Northern Lights, the pit crew would fix one thing and another thing would break. Somehow, they even managed to break the drivetrain (don't ask...). Does that say something about the structural integrity of our robot? Yeah. But is it true that some robots are flimsy but just don't happen to be rammed into the wall? Definitely.

Disappointment stinks. But what stinks worse is not being able to learn from it, or not using the experience to make anything better, or completely looking on the experience as negative. Some team members of 3081 have decided that because of our performance at Northern Lights, the whole season sucked. Not true. There are highs and lows, but keep this in mind:

It's robotics. Win or lose, it'll pay off in the long run.