New Offseason FRC Event – In China!!

[PayneTrain]

Originally Posted by Fletch1373

I would love to volunteer my time and abilities to help these teams! (I'd also kinda like the adventure/vacation to China)

As for the parts, I would contact FIRST. The spare parts cases for each of the fields have multiple of all of the parts listed. Considering many of them aren't usable with next year's game, FIRST might be willing to make a charitable donation to these teams(or at least loan them out for the event). I know FIRST loves expanding into new areas, and this would be a big leap in China.

More teams than you think have these kinds of parts and definitely won't be missing their digital sidecars.

[MrTechCenter]

Wow! This is incredible! If you need someone to teach LabView and/or electronics, shoot me a message! As for the parts, I know we have most of these but I'll have to check if we are in a position to donate them.

[orangemoore]

I may be able to get our team to loan out an 8-slot CRIO. I will check that and the other stuff.

[JB987]

It may be helpful to point out that our 3 teams are only sending a limited number of student and adult representatives as a fair share of our travel costs are to be covered by our hosts. In addition to attending the scrimmage we will be training organizers and volunteers, facilitating the set up and operation of the field and matches and putting on the workshops. We are certainly fortunate one of our alumni/mentors is an FTA and others are robot inspectors, etc...One of the goals of the visit is to help our Chinese friends learn how to ultimately put on their own regional as early as 2016. There has also been some discussion about members of their teams coming to Las Vegas in July for additional workshops, dependent upon availability of financial support from their benefactors in China. We certainly hope everything works out as planned and are excited to partake in this new chapter in the growth of FIRST FRC!

[cadandcookies]

With the help of three teams as fantastic as you guys, I'm sure a China regional is well in the future. I will be very interested to see how well FRC catches on overseas. Soon enough we may be looking at a truly global competition.

[P.J.]

Originally Posted by cadandcookies

With the help of three teams as fantastic as you guys, I'm sure a China regional is well in the future. I will be very interested to see how well FRC catches on overseas. Soon enough we may be looking at a truly global competition.

I know that the team out of the Netherlands that was at champs was talking about working towards a European Regional by 2018, so hopefully that will work out for them as well. I'm so excited to see this kind of growth.

[Tom Ore]

The FRC 525 mentors and recent graduates are flying out of Chicago to Hong Kong tomorrow. The students and our team leader will fly out on Saturday. (Cedar Falls school starts tomorrow so they can't leave until Saturday - the students will miss 5 days of school.)

The scrimmage is in Shenzhen. We'll spend Saturday and Sunday getting things set up. The scrimmage will run from Monday until mid-day Wednesday. Then we'll have a workshop for the rest of Wednesday and all day Thursday. Friday is for sightseeing and back to Chicago on Saturday the 23rd.

There will be 4 US teams (525, 694, 987 and 1595). We're expecting 6 of the 8 Chinese teams from last year and 11 new Chinese teams.

[Shrub]

This is really, really cool. It's amazing to see that FIRST has spread so far, and there will be 11 new teams just this year! If I ever study abroad I'd love to meet these teams. I wish all the teams best of luck!

[artdutra04]

When you're sightseeing, Victoria Peak in Hong Kong has beautiful views of Hong Kong island and Kowloon.

The lines at the Shenzhen Bay border crossing always seem to be shorter than the Lok Ma Chau or Lo Wu HK/mainland border crossings, but unless it's a major travel day you can probably get through any of these in 30 minutes or less. If it's a major travel day it might take 2-3 hours to get through customs and immigration.

Also, the Google Maps views between Satellite and Maps view are intentionally off by a random amount (sometimes up to a half kilometer) due to a Chinese law. However if you go to ditu.google.com the maps view will be the same between Satellite and Maps view. The reason this version works fine is because this maps view shows the Chinese territorial borders as claimed by China.

Edit: you can leave the lights and AC on in your hotel room 24/7 by sticking any random card into the slot by the door. Otherwise the AC will turn off when you leave the room.

[Steven Donow]

I hope you guys bring a camera along and film some stuff!

[Tom Ore]

Originally Posted by artdutra04

When you're sightseeing, Victoria Peak in Hong Kong has beautiful views of Hong Kong island and Kowloon.

We were there during our workshop last Christmas - it was amazing. Here's a view of Victoria Harbor.

[Tom Ore]

We're here in Shenzhen. It's a long trip to get here - left home about 5:15 AM Thursday to drive to Chicago. The flight is 15 1/2 hours and we were held up at the gate for 2 hours for repairs - so we were on the plane for 17 1/2 hours. Arrived in Hong Kong about 8:00 PM Friday. (China is 13 hours ahead.) Had to go through the line for immigration into Hong Kong, then a ride to the border with mainland China and immigration into mainland China, then the drive to the hotel and finally got into our hotel rooms around midnight.

[mwmac]

This is very exciting news...good luck to all involved in making it a big success.

[Tom Ore]

Here are a couple of pics. The venue is the basketball arena that was built for the 2011 University Games.

[Dunngeon]

Originally Posted by PayneTrain

More teams than you think have these kinds of parts and definitely won't be missing their digital sidecars.

Don't even get me started, so excited to have the RoboRio next year.