Driving Age For FRC

[DanBrowne]

I was under the impression that Jr. HS members could drive as long as there were no HS members who were able to drive at the time.

[Thad House]

Originally Posted by DanBrowne

I was under the impression that Jr. HS members could drive as long as there were no HS members who were able to drive at the time.

There is no restriction on who can drive as long as they are pre-college. A baby could drive a robot at competition, and there would be no rules prohibiting it.

(I do not condone letting a baby drive a robot, and take no responsibility if somebody gets hurt by letting one.)

[Christopher149]

Originally Posted by Thad House

There is no restriction on who can drive as long as they are pre-college. A baby could drive a robot at competition, and there would be no rules prohibiting it.

(I do not condone letting a baby drive a robot, and take no responsibility if somebody gets hurt by letting one.)

Strictly speaking, could you get a baby to have a properly filled out STIMS?

Anyways, middle school students have been drivers, and being able to see (and have STIMS, and the driver button) should be the only reasonable constraint.

[Whippet]

I "drove" for a few practice matches in Dallas in 2011 at age 12. There were no issues. In fact, the queueing volunteers thought it was awesome that my team was including such young people.

As always, check the manual. If it's not expressly prohibited, it's OK.

[Calvin Hartley]

As stated a plethora of times above, there is no 16-year-old requirement for drivers.

However, not knowing who you heard this from, my first thought is that maybe this is a restriction placed by your own team? While I would certainly not agree with having a team-enforced age restriction for drive team, I see no reason (by the rules) for a team to do that. Or was your team (as a whole) informed this by someone outside the team?

-Calvin

[orangemoore]

The only reason I do not think that the game manual spells out how old you have to be is that FRC is meant for High school students I don't think the FIRST is really expecting many people younger than that to be participating in FRC. It seems that the rule is interpreted by people at different events different ways but for the most part anyone(within reason and the rules) should be able to drive.

[safiq10]

Just for fun....
What if your drivers are highschool students taking college classes at a local community college? They get the same rights as a college student educationally. So are they still "pre-college"

As others have said, as long as the individual is not a college student, nor college student age, there is no problem having them on the drive team.

For the record, I think 330's driver of a few years may be 15 by now (though I could be mistaken).

[SoCalPhil]

330's driver is 14 and started driving at 11.