The Not So-Secret Secret End-Game

[Bryan Herbst]

Originally Posted by Kevin Sevcik

I suspect he means they're lenient about size, weight, and all the other inspection requirements during the practice rounds, since robots don't have to pass inspection to play in practice matches. They can be banned from practice matches if the LRI, FTA, etc deem them unsafe, though. Which a 63" tall robot would probably be.

More or less this. Both the inspectors and the field staff really want to see your robot compete on the field. Sometimes this means overlooking a minor rule violation (maybe one of the numbers on your bumpers fell off) on the condition that you fix it in the near future.

I've also seen plenty of instances in which a team adds something to their robot (such as a frisbee blocker in 2013) during qualifications, and the refs aren't entirely sure if it is within the height regulations or not. If it is not an egregious violation and either it is early enough in the competition or the field is running significantly behind, they might let it slide for a round.