pic: Taking Out the Trash

[Andy Baker]

Aaaaaah! The decision to toss this design and go with a simpler solution beat us in Chicago.

More to the story:

We were neighbors to team 65 this past weekend. Ken turns to me on Thursday afternoon and tells me that his team is ready to give up on his gripper design. He asks me what I think. I say, too, that it should be tossed and replaced with their newer, more simpler design.

So... Friday, team 65 is dropping tetras with their new design, but getting slowly better. By Saturday morning, they are OK at it, and end up with a great last Q match of the day and scored 5 or 6 tetras.

Then, in the elimination rounds, the alliance of 383, 903, and 65 meets the alliance of 269, 45, 706 in the semi-finals. Team 65 and their new gripper proceed to trounce us all in tetra scoring. During the first match of this semi-final round, we traded tetra scoring with them and ended up with a stack 10 high (we both wanted to own the center and side goals). When the second pick on one alliance (383, 903, 65) can keep up with the scoring ability of another alliance's (269, 45, 706) first pick, there is trouble brewing for the other alliance. At the end of that round, 383, 903, and 65 were the victors and we were packing our pits.

Great job to 65 for making the change and creating a quick tetra scorer. They were averaging 6-7 tetras each match in the finals. I forsee them to only get better in Atlanta. Kudos to Stevie, Ken and all of the Huskie Brigade.

Andy B.