2007 Midwest Regional!

[Weepy]

Who's ready?
About half of 2047 is composed of Whitney Young students, and we attend school three blocks away from the UIC Pavilion. I believe that team 'Impossible Mission Force' has a healthy chunk of Whitney Young students as well, and they should be making an appearance there as well.

This is going to be Team Challenger's second regional ever, and we're almost certain that the Wisconsin regional taught us enough to give everyone a run for their money.

We've heard that some tough cookies like Wildstang will be competing, so this will definitely be an exciting round-about.

Who's coming? Maybe we can all get together and eat dinner after the Thursday matches. 2047 knows where all the good eats are at

[Jeremiah Johnson]

Originally Posted by Weepy

Who's ready?
About half of 2047 is composed of Whitney Young students, and we attend school three blocks away from the UIC Pavilion. I believe that team 'Impossible Mission Force' has a healthy chunk of Whitney Young students as well, and they should be making an appearance there as well.

This is going to be Team Challenger's second regional ever, and we're almost certain that the Wisconsin regional taught us enough to give everyone a run for their money.

We've heard that some tough cookies like Wildstang will be competing, so this will definitely be an exciting round-about.

Who's coming? Maybe we can all get together and eat dinner after the Thursday matches. 2047 knows where all the good eats are at

HA! Tough cookies like 111??? Haha... j/k. A top tier team right there. But seriously. MWR is going to rock the stuff this week. Look out for teams such as 71, 107, 111, 288, 501, 648 (duh!), 1525, and 1625. All those teams produce good machines. Especially that last one. A third year team and already have two regional W's and a Galileo Finalist?? lol. I predict that two or more of those great veteran teams listed before will ally with each other. Seems to happen every year.

I, personally, am looking forward to staying at the same hotel as 107 and just chilling with them after the events. Same goes for the Championship, too. Lav and 107 are great people. TWISTER! Team 648 and I made a twister mat and flicker board for about 30 people or so to play. No video games are allowed from 648 this year! Per my orders.*





*I had to make a playlist for my iPod that has "okay-to-play" songs on it. Mom won't let me play my "devil music" around them. LOL. Doesn't she know I'm Christian, too? Sorry, I just thought someone would chuckle from that.

[Kellen Hill]

Just from past experience I am sorta scared slash really interested in what Beatty and Wildstang came up with. I will make sure to get good pictures of them thursday and post them here so others can see. I can't wait for the competition, it should be really fun!

[MasterChief1732]

I sure hope we do well during this week's Midwest regional. We got so close in the Milwaukee regional! We got into the semi-finals with The "green machine" and "UltraViolet" even though we were seeded 32nd, but fortunatly good scouting allowed us to be picked for the 2nd seed! It was unfortunate that the "green machine's" drive system broke down during our final elimination match before the finals, but we only lost by 6 points in a 2 against 3 match (with the help of the green machine's ramps) I wish everyone the best of luck. Go Hilltoppers! Team 1732!

[Weepy]

Hey, you guys were our pit neighbors!

Did you hear the giant groan from the top of the stands when we saw that match? You guys had three of our favorite bots from the competition, and alot of us from 2047 thought you guys were going to go all the way. At any rate, you sure did give everyone a run for their money!

[lav]

The Midwest Regional has a great tradition and I can't wait to see what our friends have in store for us this year. Team 107 is "ramped" and ready to go!

Looking forward to a great round of Twister too!

[Sgt. Mammoth]

Originally Posted by Weepy

Hey, you guys were our pit neighbors!

Did you hear the giant groan from the top of the stands when we saw that match? You guys had three of our favorite bots from the competition, and alot of us from 2047 thought you guys were going to go all the way. At any rate, you sure did give everyone a run for their money!

For us, that was like a dream team-- The Green Machine was my favorite robot--I was thrilled when they picked us, and then topped off with UltraViolet. It's too bad the transmissions blew when they did, but hey, we'll try again this week!

Good luck all!

[Sharkbyte]

Milwaukee was awesome, and I know the Midwest will be too. We actually had a decent bot by the time we got to the regional, and with how we did in Milwaukee, I can't wait to find out how we'll stand up to the heavy hitters like 111 and the beast. Best of luck to everyone going.

[Kellen Hill]

I saw you guys(1732) at Milwaukee and you guys did very well in finals. I was rooting for your alliance and the number five alliance because they had rockford robotics who we are sorta mentoring. I was glad to see you guys do well this year. See ya in a couple of days!

[Jeremiah Johnson]

Hey Lav! Is 107 bringing any Vex robots? I'll have at least one of mine there. It's pretty pimped out. Nearly a scale model of our 07 bot. Definitely looking forward to a sweet game of Twister on Thursday or Friday night. Not sure when it is. I can't wait to see what 107 brings in their arsenal also. A 107 ramp bot sounds like a perfect compliment to our bot.

Good luck to all the teams coming to Chicago. God, I'm so excited!

me, val, and roxanna are gunna be there cheering on wildstang on saturday!
-Courty-

[Weepy]

Is it just me, or are all the drivers getting just a bit more vicious with each match?

[shawger]

Originally Posted by Weepy

Is it just me, or are all the drivers getting just a bit more vicious with each match?

Thursday was absolutely ridiculous. One team in particular (who I'm not going to name) smashed us into the rack and managed to break our PVC arm. They didn't break the glued parts, they actually snapped the PVC. In addition, they had a fairly thin chassis with no bumpers, so they somehow climbed up on our bumpers and broke off our radio, which was mounted vertically right above and slightly inward from the bumper. Needless to say, we spent plenty of time fixing after that.

There were also several other teams that were pretty rough.

During the qualification rounds, I thought the viciousness decreased by quite a bit, but the elimination rounds got pretty nasty. The judges didn't seem to be watching out for this sort of thing too carefully either. I only remember one 10pt penalty for breaking the bumper zone, and that was when a team got their arm stuck inside Wildstang.

[Sgt. Mammoth]

Originally Posted by Weepy

Is it just me, or are all the drivers getting just a bit more vicious with each match?

Ouch, tell me about it. Sometimes it just got downright brutal. Did you see what happened to the Beast? Yikes.

Our arm/gripper took quite a beating through all the matches, but luckily nothing that wasn't fixable. Although it did get scary during the match.

[Weepy]

Yeah, Spencer from 1982 told me that they had to replace their claw TWICE.

I was crying for 447, and I was in tears for 1710! Our alliance partner in the semifinals, 1706, had their track knocked off their claw system. Then 2112 got stuck on our Lexan panels after pinning us in the corner, which made everyone in our side fall out of their chairs.

One of the volunteers suggested to our drivers to act more aggressively, and I raised an eyebrow to that.

No one was that aggressive at Milwaukee!

But WOW. That was the craziest final I've seen ANYWHERE in the sports world. Grats to everyone! Especially 648 for that awesome display of autonomous sock rocking.

2047 will see everyone in Atlanta. But... the thing is...
I kind of promised the girls on the team that I'd wear a dress at the Championship if we went D:

Oh, out of curiosity... did anyone notice the 'FIRST Cadenza' poster I put up in our pit?

GREAT JOB EVERYONE! The judges and FIRST staffers won't forget the 2007 Midwest Regional anytime soon!