Quote:
Originally posted by Mark_lyons
Interesting.. First of all, are your coaches adults or students? Does your coach have any specific responsibility during a match? If so, what are they?
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There are varied opinions on whether coaches should be adults or students, but our coaches have always been adults. This year our coach, and lead engineer is Andy Baker.
Our ultimate goal would be for the coach to say nothing during a match, except to maybe count down time for a last-second return to our end zone. In reality, with the help of the human player who helps keep track of the score, the coach makes strategy decisions during matches and gives instructions accordingly. As the season progresses, more and more of these decisions fall on the drivers. Am I stating this correctly, Andy.
During three of the years that we had two coaches, I was "driver/operator coach" and was mainly responsible for watching the performance of our robot and giving instructions related to performance issues with the robot. Part of my job was also to work with the drivers in making sure the robot was "ready to go" at the start of the match.
Also, as sort of "captain of the ship," part of our coach's job is to take responsibility if something goes wrong during a match. We try very hard to avoid situations where a student driver is "blamed" for mistakes made during a match.