Team 4814, Reflections on our 2013 Season

[Jilani]

We are Team 4814, a rookie team from London Ontario, Canada. We have come a long way from almost not having a team due to the Ontario Teacher Strike.

This is Our Story.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K57NxXjyYpw

[If you need a reason to watch]


Our success would not have been possible without the support of our Sponsors and Parents. There are also a few teams we would like to thank for helping us have an absolutely stellar rookie season.

1114 – Ever since the start of the season, we tried to emulate our team like you guys, striving for excellence and gracious professionalism, both on and off the field. You guys were extremely friendly at GTR West (Karthik, you’re the best!). We were rooting for you guys at Champs, and were really hoping for you guys to win it all again on Einstein. Even after your climber had issues, we were amazed by how close you guys were able to keep the score. We look forward to competing with you guys at IRI and the upcoming season!

2056 – Words still cannot describe how happy we felt when we got picked by you and 1114. It was truly an unbelievable moment. We learned a lot from you guys playing together in the elimination matches at GTR West. Play smart and play to your strengths – we really took this to heart. When we realized you were also in Curie, thoughts of pairing up with you guys were already running through heads. During the elimination matches, we were cheering for you, hoping we could meet again in the final matches of Curie. We wish you guys the best of luck at IRI and the upcoming season!

67- When the list of teams in Curie were released we quickly established you and 2056 as the main contenders for the 1st alliance, we joked about how amazing it would be if once again we were the 3rd pick for the 1st alliance. Going from that mindset to being in a position to pick you was just CRAZY. I calmly called your number but on the inside I freaking out at the fact that we, a rookie team, just asked a Hall of Fame team to join our alliance. It was incredible. Our elimination run with you and 1918 was surreal. Thanks so much for carrying our alliance to the finals in Curie, we were so close to making it onto Einstein.

1918 – We were shocked that you were left that late in the draft, easily the steal of the second round at Curie. We watched a few of your matches at MSC before going to St. Louis and were awestruck at how you were able to do every single part of the game extremely well (floor pickup, shoot, less than 30sec 30 pt climb and dump). Probably one of the most inspirational moments for me was seeing you guys work so hard to maintain your robot after those 2 falls. Those falls from the pyramid would have been season ending for any other team!

1310 – Coopetition at its best. Thank you for helping us out with scouting and strategy for Curie. As a rookie team we underestimated the value of scouting (who would’ve thought we would go 8-0?), but you were there to help us, even though it was against your best interest.

3756 – It was a pleasure to work with you this year. This season has made us into one big family. It was really easy for us to forget that we were two teams! Our time together at GTR West and Champs was amazing, thank you for being such an amazing mentor team. Feel the heat!

I would also like to thank our main sponsor Western Engineering. WE FIRST is a FIRST robotics mentorship club started up at Western University Canada to help mentor FIRST teams in the area. This year, due to the entire teacher labor dispute in Ontario, they took a leap of faith and founded a community based FRC team. We only had one mentor over the age of 23, with 7 mentors being university students. They’ve sacrificed a lot for us to have a team this season, and have taught us so much. We will always be grateful for their help this season and for many seasons to come.

Team 4814, will be the only rookie team competing at IRI! Make sure to come and say hi!