Returning from my first tournament as coach

[iblis432]

I return tonight as a very proud mentor. We went expecting to do a minimal amount of good activity, we felt we hadn't met enough to be efficient. We went home with the Core Values award and third place, winning us a place in the state championship. As my first year being in the coach position, I feel truly blessed to have such a good 'rookie' year, and I couldn't be more happy or proud of the team I was given. I held my team to the standards of an FRC team, worried that my members would break under such strain, but instead they rose to the bar and were commended by the judges for showing the core values better than any team they had seen before in their years of judging. Let this be a shout-out to my FLL Team 5400 The Lego Ceasers, for making me such a proud coach.

[Meredith Novak]

Nice job. I am going to share this with our rookie FLL coaches who are very nervous about competing.

[Eagleeyedan]

Cool! My rookie year, 2007, my team went to a scrimmage in Appleton, WI to see what it was going to be like. There, 2 weeks before competition, we learned we have to have a research project and a unique robot. With 2 weeks left, we crammed all the time we could to get it all done. Went to competition expecting to get Against All Odds but ended up with Robot Performance and, of all thing, Champions! We went to state then but got no award. I was on the team for 2 more years and we went to state every time winning various awards (teamwork, Gracious professionalism, innovative project etc.) and my last year on the team, we tied for the WI state champions award 5 times in deliberations so the judges looked at robot score. Another team had 3 points more so they went instead. We still have not broken the record of going to state and just today, WON CHAMPIONS AGAIN! Now, I'm a mentor of 2 years, my mom is the new coach, and my 3 siblings are on the team, and one of the other original members is also mentoring. I'm also in FRC and have done Google Lunar X Moonbots.

Hope that inspires you to continue on in FLL! Coaching can be tough but it is so worth it!