Driver Selection: A Discussion

[Katie_UPS]

Hey CD,

So whenever I meet up with a certain FIRSTer, he and I have numerous conversations about various aspects of FRC Teams. One of our more interesting conversations revolve around the topic of driver selection.

We have streamlined driver selections to two sections:

-Skill (This includes ability with the joysticks as well as mental ability)

-Reward (This is our blunt way of describing when teams give it to the most dedicated students/senior students/etc.)

Some argue that drivers should be picked solely on skill, while others think that there should be a reward aspect to driving.

One scenario that's been brought up is a hypothetical team who has two students who, from day one, know they want to be drivers. The students obtain small remote controlled vehicles with a drive-base similar to that of the teams and play a new game everyday with the vehicles. This is all they do at the meetings. This fine-tuns both their skills with the joysticks as well as their driving-mentality.

Should they get the drive team positions?

One can argue that they should as they are the most qualified based on their skill.

Another can argue that they should not, as they have not done the work to reap the 'benefits' of being on the drive team.

Opinions? Thoughts? (The hypothetical situation does not need to be referenced)

[Taylor]

I would prefer my driver to be knowledgeable about the game, strategy-minded, and coachable. An outstanding, if overlooked, quality of a great driver is the ability to do exactly as told, when told, without second-guessing. Robot driving is not the place for ego or bravado. The person can be the best driver in the world, but when the penalties add up due to lack of robot and game knowledge or communication skills, it's no good.
This scenario strongly suggests that the prospective drivers are headstrong and cocky, not what I'm looking for.

Edit: A key skill that drivers need is the ability to diagnose problems. If the drivers have little to no interaction with the design and construction of the actual robot and its subsystems, then when (not if) catastrophes occur, the driver cannot provide insightful, useful information.

[the man]

Personally I think a combination of both skill and team dedication are required. So the most dedicated and skilled members should drive. My 2 cents.

[,4lex S.]

Formula SAE runs into a lot of the same issues. It is my teams mentality that only involved members are going to be driving the car at competition. This is because they know the systems well, and they put in the bulk of the work (plus they will not abuse the car in our endurance event ).

It is a competition between involved members, but I can't see FIRST getting the desired effect out of a dedicated robot driver who doesn't do anything else on the robot. It could happen, just don't think its likely.

[Mark Sheridan]

I personally think its not so much how much skill a drivers has but can the driver develop skills. Our team is really dead set to try to do some form of a practice robot next year, even if its just 50 percent of the competition robot. We had hardly any practice time this year, even the most skillful drivers need practice time to get used to the robot.

With that train of thought, I am more inclined to pick a driver as a reward. A dedicated student will be willing take the extra time to practice, with a practice or past year's robot. Plus a dedicated student usually is well versed in the strategy and the construction of the robot (very helpful for pin pointing problems).

Other things I look for is ability to work well with others, follow instructions, handles criticism gracefully, is cool under pressure and competitive drive.

I tell my students, that being the driver is not glamorous. It a stressful job that requires a lot of extra hours. One can't casually want to be a driver, nor can one want it for the title. One has to put in the extra effort and show me that I can count on them to help the team no matter what (well within reason).

[rcmolloy]

I'll make a large post about this soon. I would just like to state that this is the same as any other competition. This is just a major question to contemplate.

Do the people down on the floor want to be there during finals knowing that they need to do an x amount of things to win or they will lose?

Yes dedication and skill do come down to driving, however, the people who want to be driving the most and make that shown should be handed the opportunity.

What we usually do is have our drivers practice a lot, but also help in the following areas:

1. Drive Train/Attachment building - Depending on whether they control the drive or the attachments
2. Programming/Pseudo Coding for part they control
3. Strategy team - works with coach and mentors
4. RULE READING - Similar to strategy, our drivers must know the rules. All of them.
5. Extra things that vary year to year - Sometimes the endgame

This is just what we do, but it helps our drivers know what they're working with, and how it works.

[Mark Holschuh]

Our drivers are chosen based on several criteria. They have to have put in the time duing the building, so that they are very knowlegable about the robot and the programming. This gives them the insight to be able to quickly troubleshoot problems. They have to demonstrate their knowledge of the rules by taking a test, which minimizes the number of penalties against us. They have to have good driving abilities, often from practicing with robots or from experience with remote control airplanes and ground vehicles. Finally, they have to be able to handle the stress of driving, which is extremely difficult if everything isn't going well.

I hate it when parents come up to me and complain that their kid should be driving...

[J_Miles]

There are dozens of factors that go into choosing drivers, I feel. To have the best drivers for your team, I think you have to carefully consider a lot.

First, the team member in question must be a dedicated member of the team. If the member in question has priorities other than FRC that trump competitions, they can't be given the driver's position, because if another obligation comes up, you may become sans-driver for a competition.

Second, ideally, I think, drivers should have a working knowledge of the robot, so that he/she may help to diagnose problems on the fly, as well as work with programmers, designers, and builders to create a robot that works seamlessly with the requirements of the game and the driver's preferences

Another important factor for driver selection is workability and chemistry. If your team uses two drivers for the robot, those two must be able to work well together. If they do not communicate well, you're looking at a disaster waiting to happen. Drivers also should be obedient yet intelligent. Drivers should be able to follow instructions without hesitation, but must also be aware enough to challenge an instruction when needed.

Obviously, with all of these things in mind, the driver must also have skill, or at least potential. If a driver is nervous and inconsistent behind the controls, he/she may not be a good fit. If he or she improves a bit then hits a plateau that doesn't quite take full advantage of the robot's capabilities, he/she may not be a good fit. The ideal driver can correct his/her little errors quickly and independently, is willing to listen to and carefully consider criticism, and can and will improve throughout the season.

So, I don't think that the situation can ever be quite as simple as the original post implies, but to answer the question: I think that dedicated students should be rewarded in some way, but, at the same time, if a student is not a good fit for the driver's position, then a different reward can probably be determined. The goal of competing on the field is, honestly, to win competitions. As such, a driver behind the controls should be a mean to that end, just not a position won as a prize.

[WizenedEE]

I believe it should be based on skill, but there is no way a driver can have the skills required without helping build the robot.

[Tristan Lall]

In theory the ideal driver doesn't even need a coach. They're so masterful that they have the strategy covered as well. Good luck finding or creating that driver.

I'm not sure if I was trying to pull that stunt when I was driving a robot, years ago. We had a combination of a first-year university student mentor as coach, and me as driver—and although we got along excellently, I'm really not sure how accurately I reacted to his coaching suggestions. (Then again, maybe he was so good at planting suggestions that he didn't need to explain anything. I really wasn't consciously paying attention to him...which is something I wouldn't advise under ordinary circumstances.) Most of the time it worked, but there were a couple of tactically-excellent, but strategically-unfortunate decisions that would have benefitted from a more refined coach-driver relationship (like pushing an opponent's robot 50 feet across the field, including up and over a big ramp, kicking and screaming...and getting pushed most of the way back when once our battery voltage dropped low enough to reboot the robot controller ).

An interesting side effect of that particular robot was that the function operator (i.e. driver #2) had very little to do. From a controllability point of view, it probably would have been better just to give full control to one driver. But on the team at the time, being a driver was also a prestige position, and that fact (combined with some implementation details of the controls) made it impractical to design the interface around a single driver and leave the other driver with literally nothing to drive.

Desirable though it might be to share the prestige and responsibility among two people, I think a team needs to be ready to hand off complete robot control to a single person, so that there's one less brain in the loop trying to make the robot do stuff, and one more set of eyes watching the field and manipulating game pieces (when possible).

And if the drivers can't calculate strategy on the fly as well as a dedicated coach (and especially given the calibre of coaching available to some teams, the drivers very often can't), then the coach needs to be assertive enough to be noticed, competent enough to understand each game on the fly, and consistent enough to avoid ambiguity and communicate nuances seamlessly. Practice makes this work. (In my days as a student, we never had enough time to practice with a working robot.)

Similarly, making the coach a prestige position doesn't really work. I tried coaching once; I wasn't great at it. Firstly, I was coaching my brother as driver—so what were the odds he'd listen to me unquestioningly? Secondly, I'd been primarily involved with the technical development of the robot—so I was always on call to help fix robot issues. We didn't really have a dedicated strategy team at the time, so I didn't have the benefit of other peoples' research into what the opponents were doing, or even the background knowledge to choose what the strategy should have been for the next match.

The coach and the drivers need to be on top of the strategy from the start. That's what they'll be applying throughout the match, so it makes sense for them to dedicate their energies at events to that task alone. Don't let the pit crew drive. You need them to make sure the robot is functional at all times. Despite that rigid separation of roles, there needs to be some cross-training of skills. The pit crew needs to understand strategy to prioritize repairs—what can we do without next match? The drivers and coach need to understand robot operation at a technical level, so that they can perceive malfunctions, and don't try to make the robot do unrealistic things.

Rewarding excellence is important, and since your most skilled students probably deserve recognition for that attribute, you'd make them very happy by letting them take the prestigious role of driver. So in a roundabout way, driving can be a prestige position without harming performance. But that only works if the all-around skill is there—mastery of strategy by early in build season, mastery of driving toward the end of the build season, and competence in terms of understanding robot performance and failure modes.

[JVN]

My methods:
http://blog.iamjvn.com/2011/02/robot...selection.html

[Chris is me]

Here's how I do it.

First I look for potential. Driving takes quick decision making and the ability to fluidly make decisions. Students who do best during "crunch time" robot repairs, stressful situations, and build arguments are favored for driving the robot. You don't want someone passive, but you want someone who can stay calm and filter out distractions.

On top of that, maturity is very helpful. We don't really have big maturity problems on the team, but mature and responsible drivers are a must. Students that really understand that the team is placing the robot literally in their hands.

Then I look at natural talent. This is much less of a big deal as it might seem, but since my team does not have as much drive time to really polish a driver, students who have experience driving things like RC cars, RC airplanes, Vex robots, etc. are favored initially.

At this point, it's determined by who puts more dedication into early drive practice. Day before Kickoff is the final selection.

[jamie_1930]

From what I've seen over the years being the Drive Team Lead for 2228 is that dedication to the team and involvement is a must, skill is third to and understanding of the rules and game strategy. Skill is relative in my mind and meaningless more than that, skill can be taught and skilled drivers are just those that are more experienced. Whether it be more experienced from previous games or just more experience with the current robot.

By giving a driver more time driving the robot is the best.....only way for a driver to really obtain skill. And on that note when you are having drivers practice it is not the best thing to do to, to just have them run drills. Especially when first getting acquainted with the robot. When first "introducing" driving to a new recruit what I would do is explain the controls and then have them go forward, back, turn left, turn right (taking only 30 seconds to do this) and then say "okay now just mess around with it for 5 minutes and then give me a call." Give drivers time to explore what can be done with the robot, not what we think it can do. Also on another not when you are having them go forward back etc. etc. make sure when they push the joystick forward is when the robot goes forward. When I was first on the drive team (as the turret operator on our 2009 robot) our driver spent 2 weeks driving the robot backwards and for some reason never spoke up about it, it is a simple fix and leads to needless confusion. Now once they've gotten acquainted with the robot, then start running different drills of what you want them to do. And as a drive coach you have one very important mission during competition and that is to not lose your voice. Barking commands at drivers like go forward...no wait back up....go for that ball........reverse roller...etc. etc. etc. is the worst possible way to have your team operate. Your drivers are smart and they can think for themselves, guide them through what you're doing and teach them judgement. This way you won't have to tell them what to do on the field. You can go into the game with a plan, they will carry out and adjust, then you can just look at the overall field and score as it advances and point out different things they might not have noticed. This is the approach I took with our drive team this year and it worked amazingly compared to the previous years barking, which was a horrific nerve racking experience I would never like to repeat. One last little thing I would like to add to how to train drivers (I know this isn't what you asked, but I'm reminiscing) is that you need to try and balance what people are there observing practice. This is because I find that the hardest thing about trying to implement this new judgement oriented approach to driving was that, when I stopped barking other people started. And this is natural because the team is trying to help. People will sit there and say don't open the claw.......lift the arm.....stop.....now forward.......good......open. and this is an impulse many people have when watching the robot, but it doesn't let the drivers use their own judgement. Plus it allows them to rely on outside eyes, people looking from angles not available to them when they're driving. So what I would suggest is to do a quick showcase of the robot doing non-sense, drive around, move actuators, etc. Then get everyone out and lock yourself in behind closed doors and shut blinds so that you can do the real practice and learning. Also this helps build up the drive team comradery, when you guys (or girls) are just there by yourselves working as a single unit.

Okay sorry about that, but back to your question, how to select drivers, what's important? A drivers dedication ensures they will be there when they're needed. Another thing is I want my drivers to have a knowledge of all aspects of the robot programming, electrical, and mechanical. So that when things go wrong on the field they can properly analyze, diagnose, and fix the situation. This year during one of our last matches the right drive chain snapped and just by looking at how we moved we were able to figure out what was wrong, explain it to our alliance, and specify we can not travel, but we can pivot, meaning that we could still possibly line up our minibot from our current location. Other things that are essential for a driver, co driver, human player, and for the coach (especially for the coach) is everyone of those people must have sat down and read all of the rules in the game section (minimum). Actually I would prefer they read every section beginning to end from the introduction of what FIRST is to the tournament section (or whatever the last section is) twice, taking time to reflect on what they have read and what situations they pertain to. If you get to competition and you don't know the rules........what are you doing there?

So to summarize:
-Skill = driving time with the robot (anyone can drive they just need time)
-Dedication is a must
-Insight and knowledge is what makes great drivers
-Know the robot, Love the robot, Be the robot (not a robot)
-Teach your drivers judgement
-Also something not yet noted make sure your drive team is a team, people need to get along and drivers are the ambassadors of the team, everyone sees them and they represent the team. Make sure you pick good people to do that

Hope that some of this helps and again I'm sorry for the rant in the middle, good luck, have fun!

[Duke461]

The biggest thing that's overlooked when selecting your drivers, is that they will be representing your team at any given competition. Yes, Skill is very important. Yes, strategy is very important. Knowledge of the game, maturity, listening to your coach, etc. are all important, but you must remember that these kids are the ones that most everyone will see-- the ones that the judges will most likely see and/or talk to, the ones that the other teams will most likely associate with, etc.
If the kids that you select are fantastic drivers, know what to do, but have an awful attitude, and aren't graciously professional, the other teams will talk about them negatively. Popular to contrary belief, Robotics is not free from teenager actions such as Gossip and spreading negativity. Obviously, you want your team to be known as a nice team and a helpful team. Now, I'm most certainly NOT saying that drivers are the only influence on how "kind" and GP a team is--many factors determine that. But at a competition, they will stand out the most out of anyone.
In short, many factors, such as skill and knowledge of the game affect driver choice. But one of the most overlooked factors is how do these team members represent your team.
Hope this helps.
-duke