[Greg Needel]

Ok a post of NJ.....so today I walked around for most of the day checking out the other robots and just getting a feel for the competition. Here are my thoughts for the practice rounds:

1) I can’t comment on the condition of the field because I was never on it but everything looked fine from the stands

2) Hanging- maybe 3 teams could hang every time but they were few and far between. I do remember specifically that team 716 could hang very well.

3) 2x ball....good luck, just like the hanging portion of the game very few teams could manipulate the balls. A few more teams could uncap the goals but in all the matches I watched I would say only 3 teams were successful in capping a goal.

4) Field reset- takes forever, much longer then any other game I have seen, most of this is because getting the balls in the drop bins is difficult because they have a tendency to bounce back out.

5) ball pushers - there were quite a few of these bots but today was pointless for them because during the practice rounds the "coach" from each team was on the field pushing balls to the human players. I am beginning to think that these bots will be the deciding factor of this year

6) Auto mode - ummmm non-existent a few teams tried and a few teams failed but the majority of the teams just sat there and blinked their team color light

7) Falling bots - it was very common to see teams topple over climbing the stairs and also getting hung up on balls

8) There was a very friendly atmosphere but way too quite to be a FIRST comp. maybe it was just practice day but not much cheering

Overall I am still very interested in seeing how this game will be played out tomorrow, I predict that most matches will be very low scoring and the team that hangs will win.

As for the Brazilian teams I saw them and the one with the little humanoid robot mascot's bot looks sweet and they seemed to perform well....

I will be around Delphi for a while so if anyone wants specifics on a team I will be glad to answer...