2016 Finger Lakes Regional

[Larry Lewis]

Originally Posted by esquared

Gonna miss this...

We are going to miss you! Maybe we will see you in Rochester at some point in the future.

[Dominick Ferone]

Originally Posted by dkavanagh

When one of the regional finalists in NYC already had a bid, it trickled down to our alliance captain team, who got to go. Is there a similar trickle down here, say if 2 qualifying teams are on the winning alliance (and that could certainly happen), do the 1st 2 teams on the runner-up alliance get bids?

This is what happened at tech valley.
The finalist alliance all got bids.

359 was hall of fame so its bid went to 5254
The next wild card(I forget what for but I'm assuming EI) have a bid to 229
229 won chairmans so that bid moved over to the back up not 1665.

It's actually cool that the backup not that came in and did help that alliance got a bid.

[esquared]

Originally Posted by Dominick Ferone

This is what happened at tech valley.
The finalist alliance all got bids.

359 was hall of fame so its bid went to 5254
The next wild card(I forget what for but I'm assuming EI) have a bid to 229
229 won chairmans so that bid moved over to the back up not 1665.

It's actually cool that the backup not that came in and did help that alliance got a bid.

Yes and the confusing part is we couldn't announce wildcards until AFTER Chairman's, otherwise it would have revealed that 229 won Chairman's (because the wildcard slipped past them to 1665). Quite the unusual circumstance!

[Dominick Ferone]

Originally Posted by esquared

Yes and the confusing part is we couldn't announce wildcards until AFTER Chairman's, otherwise it would have revealed that 229 won Chairman's (because the wildcard slipped past them to 1665). Quite the unusual circumstance!

I had assumed something like that's, or maybe someone on that alliance won EI.

[Josh Goodman]

Originally Posted by Dominick Ferone

I had assumed something like that's, or maybe someone on that alliance won EI.

3990, who was on the winning alliance, won EI. So, same concept.

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by esquared

Yes and the confusing part is we couldn't announce wildcards until AFTER Chairman's, otherwise it would have revealed that 229 won Chairman's (because the wildcard slipped past them to 1665). Quite the unusual circumstance!

When you mentioned wildcard "teams" I knew something was up.

[LeelandS]

Originally Posted by dkavanagh

When one of the regional finalists in NYC already had a bid, it trickled down to our alliance captain team, who got to go. Is there a similar trickle down here, say if 2 qualifying teams are on the winning alliance (and that could certainly happen), do the 1st 2 teams on the runner-up alliance get bids?

Last year,because 2/3 teams on the winning alliance won awards to qualify them for champs, and one team on the finalist alliance was already qualified, every team in the final round of FLR got a ticket to champs. With the high number of prequalified teams at FLR, will making it to the finals be all you need to qualify for champs again this year?

[Grim Tuesday]

Almost happened again this year, 5/6 teams in the final match qualified.

[pfreivald]

That was the most satisfying and frustrating regional I've ever been a part of.

After a rough three games to start, our robot went on to outperform any robot we've ever built, including our #1 seed, nearly-undefeated 2010 FLR champion robot. This included four of eight games where our robot executed what we designed it to do almost flawlessly, proving repeatedly that we could cross any defense, reliably score low, and scale the tower in seconds flat....

And we went 2-10 through the two days (including the two QF games with our downright nonsensical alliance.) We couldn't win for losing, despite meeting the vast majority of our engineering goals.

I've never witnessed a robot do that well and that poorly at the same time, and I'm as proud of my team as I am utterly befuddled.

Still, awesome regional, with some of the best people--both volunteers and other teams--of anywhere, anytime, ever. Congrats to all!

[Dominick Ferone]

First I wanna say great job to everyone at this regional. FLR has to be one of the hardest regionals. It a so evenly matched where every match had points where one little thing made the difference of winning or losing. Some coming down to penalty. Other regionals have it being top 4 sweep easy, but teams were out to the test.

On the behalf of myself and everyone of 5030 we would like to thank everyone who offered tools, parts and services helping us rebuild our robot. It was very upsetting coming out of winning the regional to having so many problems we've never expected or thought could happen. We had rebuilt almost all of our robot across these last 3 days. I'm proud of how hard our kids worked. That being said Everyone was so helpful with trying to get us back in running form. From the robot inspectors to other teams, even ones we were about to play against were trying to help. That's the true message of FIRST and I think many of us experienced that first hand. Also big thanks to 340 and 578 for inviting us over to dinner and greeting us with such hospitality.

It's amazing to see how nice everyone is here upstate here compared to downstate. How close everyone is so caring, communicate with each other so much, and everything else is amazing. It's also nice since where not in the area with all the capital district or Rochester teams but get included so much.

Also fun fact 15 of 49 teams(30.6%) of the teams are going to champs.


We got rebuilt and are excited to see how we do at champs.

[Kevin Leonard]

I firmly believe FLR is the hardest event for a #1 seed to win, due to the insane depth and parity of robots at the event.

Congrats to 20, 639, and 1405 for taking the regional, it was well fought in semifinals against you.

I also want to say thanks to 2791 for being amazing partners. This is the best machine you've ever built, and you were an amazing alliance partner. The fact that your robot isn't currently attending champs is a downright shame, and I hope you get in off the waitlist because you deserve it so much.

Shout out to 3044 for qualifying for champs! If you improve between now and champs as much as you did between TVR and FLR, you should take your division by storm!

[Angeliukm]

I'd like to comment on the difficulty of the event this year. Finger Lakes had a very deep middle tier with several phenomenal robots at the very top. You can get a decent understanding of the depth of this event by looking at the "Insights" tab for the event on The Blue Alliance. One telling metric is the qualifications capture success percentage, which was about 6% for week three, 12% for GTRE, and an incredible 25% for FLR this weekend. Things only got harder in playoffs.

With this in mind, I'd like to thank our alliance partners 639 and 1405 for our hard-won banner this weekend. 639 was a scoring machine at the low goal with a highly consistent climb, and congratulations are also due to them for winning EI. 1405 played some of the best shut-down defense I've seen all year, with a consistent scale as well; we were incredibly lucky to pick you up in the second round. Having the two scales and heavy defense on our side are what tipped those critical playoff matches in our favor.

Congratulations to the finalists, the 4930-3044-340 alliance! I'm glad that 3044 and 4930 were able to qualify for championships via wildcards, and we're looking forward to seeing you again in St. Louis.

Originally Posted by Kevin Leonard

I also want to say thanks to 2791 for being amazing partners. This is the best machine you've ever built, and you were an amazing alliance partner. The fact that your robot isn't currently attending champs is a downright shame, and I hope you get in off the waitlist because you deserve it so much.

Quoted for truth; 2791's robot this year was had the highest scoring potential of the event with the capability to fully weaken the tower by themselves by scoring only high goals. I just wish that we had faced the 5254-2791-2383 alliance in finals rather than semifinals so that Shaker could have qualified on a wildcard. Watching your first quarterfinal where you nearly broke the world high score with 194 points (no fouls) certainly made our strategy team nervous, even as we were glad to see our friends and alliance partners from last weekend doing so well.

There were so many other good teams at this event that I won't list them all, but I'd like to thank everyone for a great competition. We'll see at least 15 of you at Championships!

[LeelandS]

Originally Posted by Kevin Leonard

Congrats to 20, 639, and 1405 for taking the regional, it was well fought in semifinals against you.

Kevin, I can't understate how much we considered your alliance "the mountain" at this event. We knew if we faced you, the rest of our day would be almost decided. 5254/2791 are a fearsome offensive duo (definitely a world class combination) and 20 was sure to state how well all of you guys knew each other. Your offensive cataclysm rounded up by 2383 definitely had everyone watching. From seeing 5254 practice at Rally, to the progress you guys made through the season on through FLR, I can really see how dedicated your program is to pushing themselves as far as they can go. It's been a pleasure having you guys at FLR the past few years.

That said, I can't take anything away from 4930/3044/340. 340 is a legend in the Finger Lakes, and always a class act right up until the end. For a robot of that quality to be such a late pick truly speaks to the depth Finger Lakes offered this year. 3044, like 2791, 5254 and 20, have become spectacles at Finger Lakes these last few years, and this year they truly hit their Magnam Opus. Truly a crazy bot with such astounding accuracy. And lastly 4930. What can I even say, truly a magnificent performance from such a young team. The friends I have on 4930 have always been extremely supportive, and we frequently wished each other luck as we climbed the elim ladder together. 4930 has a truly great program and having watched their growth over the last several years tell me that this team has great things in their future.

We walked into Saturday not knowing what our Saturday afternoon was gonna be like. We had terrible consistency issues Friday, including our climber garnering us penalties that was costing us matches. By Saturday, we had those issues nailed down and were operating at almost full capacity. I've been doing this for quite some time but the time I spent with 20 and 639 today really showed me how far I have to go and how much 1405 can can improve as a whole. To pair up with a legend like 20 was truly an honor. A great team in every respect. And to pair up with 639 who has a great robot this year was a greater experience than I could have imagined. Despite being the 3rd robot on the alliance, I never felt like we were less a part of our alliance's success than our scoring powerhouse partners. We hope this will not be the last of our teams' partnerships in the future.

It's been a rollercoaster for 1405. With an event with so many teams having already competed (an such a large margin of that having been very competitive at those regionals), we were definitely wary of how our lack of experience was hitting us. We unbagged a robot that did nothing but acquire and score in the low goal, and added the climber that we had rapidly prototyped prior to FLR. We're proud to say that you wouldn't know by looking at it that that climber was nonexistent 2 weeks ago. The process we went through to develop it was a very stressed and determined one, using whatever we had on-hand (sans those shark hooks) to make it work. It's so meaningful that so many teams took such an interest in our climber and the praise we received for it was surreal.

And finally, as always, a heartfelt thank you to our friends and family on 1126. It seems like I do this every year but we cannot understate how much you guys have helped us and continue to help us. Whether it's software help, parts, strategy advice or just general support, our teams' partnership grows stronger every year and we look forward to continuing it for years to come. You guys are the best friends we could ask for and we are forever grateful for everything you've done for us. As an 1126 alumni and forever fan, you guys make me proud every day. Go SparX!

[dmelcer9]

Does anyone know if/where the individual match videos were posted?

[Adnewhouse]

We walked into this regional very unsure of how we would do. After not doing so great at Buckeye last week, we were skeptical of whether or not mechanical improvements would push us up in ranking. Like LeelandS said, this regional was a huge roller coaster, we really didn't know what was going to happen on Saturday. We had so many issues to work through on Thursday and Friday, we just couldn't tell what was going to happen next.

It was an honor to be picked by 20; you guys are amazing and we enjoyed every match that we had the pleasure of working together. 1405, you guys really were the perfect pick to compliment our alliance. Your defense shut the opposition down and your consistent climb set our alliance apart. We really hope to work with you two in the future.

5254 2383 and 2791, you guys really were an impressive alliance and we had such a good time on the field together. Those semi-final matches we played against you were played at such a high level, it was truly incredible. We are still in awe of 5254's and 2791's high goal shooters. And we hope 2791 ends up at champs somehow, because you guys have a serious chance of doing very well.

FLR this year was probably the most incredible FRC regional we've ever seen. Every match was fast-paced and incredibly well played. This is a level of game play you could easily find at champs. All the teams were really impressive and were a joy to work with during qualification matches. We really appreciate the opportunity to work with everyone. Thank you!