2012 Texas Robot Roundup

Competition Off-Season Events
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2nd Annual Texas Robot Roundup (TRR) FRC Off-Season Competition
Sponsored by Time Warner Cable and National Instruments
Planned and organized by Alamo FIRST, the ausTIN CANs – Team 2158, and Austin area teams and volunteers!
www.robotroundup.org

When:
Saturday, July 28th, 2012 (Friday, July 27th is an optional practice day)

Where:
Anderson High School, 8403 Mesa Drive, Austin, Texas
(Home of FRC Team 2158 – ausTIN CANs)

Cost:
Early Registration by May 25, 2012: $200
Regular Registration by June 29, 2012: $250
NOTE: This year, FIRST in Texas will NOT be managing registration funds, so please do not send checks there. See the Team Registration link for more details.

Registration:
Teams
Volunteers

Why:
This is an opportunity for FRC teams (Veteran, Rookie, and Pre-Rookie) from all over Texas and beyond to come together one more time after the end of the competition season to share experiences, learn from each other, build new friendships, practice and compete with their robots, and have a fun time. TRR is also an opportunity to bring new team members, mentors, sponsors, and the community up to speed on what FIRST is really all about, so please feel free to spread word of the event.

Feel free to share the attached flier. Please contact us at [email protected] with any questions!

Who’s excited?! :slight_smile:

TRR2012Flier.pdf (248 KB)


TRR2012Flier.pdf (248 KB)

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To answer some questions that are certain to come up:

  • Any Austin locals interested in taking part in the TRR Planning Committee please send an email to [email protected]. I plan to start having meetings following Championships.

  • The schedule is not finalized yet, but will be made public as soon as it is ready.

  • We plan to again host a variety of workshops, presentations, and meetings! Stay tuned for details later this summer.

  • As of right now, we plan to once again hold a Mentors Tournament and a Robot Skills Challenge. Stay tuned for sign ups to come out later this summer.

  • Like TRR 2011 and many other Off-Season Events, we do not plan to have robots inspected at TRR 2012. However, we expect teams to follow the 2012 Game Rules and abide by the values of Gracious Professional.

  • We will be working with our Head Referee, Referee crew, and the decisions of other Off-Seasons to determine if we will instate any changes to the game play rules. Any rules changed will be done so in favor of the teams. We will make announcements of any rule changes as soon as possible.

  • We plan to give out a variety of awards again this year, though the full list is still to be determined. Definitely look forward to some new additions.

  • TRR 2011 Awards were all peer-judged. As of now, the intention is to continue with this tradition.

  • The ausTIN CANs will be hosting their Annual Tin Can Food Drive. The team who contributes the most cans will receive an award.

Again, please send an email to [email protected] with any questions!

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The Bronc Botz #3481 from San Antonio will be there!!

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We’re excited to have TRR 2011 finalists, the Bronc Botz, back for 2012! Your alliance partner (148) was the first team to register (besides the host team)!

As of right now, we have 8 teams already officially registered, and at least 13 more who have told me they will be registering soon. Teams, make sure to register soon! We haven’t set an official cap yet, but may need to in order to ensure that teams each get enough qualifying rounds.

I will post a list of registered teams this weekend and continue to provide weekly updates.

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Spectrum will be registered by the end of the night. The school internet isn’t liking Google Docs right now for some reason.

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Team 441 might make an appearance!!

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Hello,
We are a team from San Diego CA, with some interest in going.
However the main issue we face at the moment is getting our robot from SD to Austin, is shipping something that is feasible in cost for a small team?
Not sure if any parent would make the 12hr drive…

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Team 3997 Screaming Chickens Lone Star Rookie All Star will be there and ready to rumble.

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We’d like to come.
Since we plan on going to IRI the weekend before…

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Oh god. Because we need more competition in Texas :wink:

Naw please do. I talked to one of your mentors for a while at Lonestar, and you guys were awesome.

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I’m thinking about mining the wisdom and experience through a workshop or a session of training and Q&A. Oh… the possibilities. Oh, oh, oh… the possibilities. :smiley: I think I’m just going to sit here and say that to myself over and over all night. It would be totally aMAZing to even dream about much less think about.

Jane

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Will there be an official field or what??

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Of course. :slight_smile: Just like last year, we are arranging for AndyMark to provide an official FIRST field. We hope to have a partial practice field for teams as well.

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Yess! Full FRC experience! Lol

Thank you

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We are extremely excited that teams from beyond Texas are interested in attending the Texas Robot Roundup. At this time, we have not yet investigated shipping options for teams, but will certainly look into how other off-season competitions that often cater to many non-local teams, like IRI, manage shipping. Please feel free to send me an email if you have any thoughts or questions about the event. We would love to be able to host your teams and will do our best to provide you with assistance and options.

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Since you guys will be at IRI, if you’re able to find any Texas teams that are attending, once the team list is announced, I believe there may be a few teams that wouldn’t mind “babysitting” your robot for a week until you guys arrived in Austin.

TigerBytes from Baton Rouge, LA is really thinking about attending. If we do, we might rent a U-Haul trailer for the weekend. It’s a 6 hour drive for us so we could just make it our team-summer-vacation-road-trip.

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Our team will speak with Andy and Chris about IRI shipment possibilities, now that BAX Global no longer does shipment from HI to US mainland due to a “reorganization” of the company when I last checked with them.
It was also part of the reason why we had to cancel going to Utah week 3 since the shipping company fell through to get our robot back in time for HI week 4.

Since a school is hosting the event, can the robot be housed (shipped) directly to your school from Indianapolis after IRI? That’s what we either need to arrange for find out from you folks what alternatives there are.

Thanks.

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I don’t see there being any issues at all with housing your shipped robot from IRI. I will be sure to check with our teach advisor and facility to be absolutely certain but otherwise don’t foresee any problems! Regardless, we should definitely be able to secure a place to safely keep your robot until you would arrive.

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Jess and Glen,

If we help at out (2468) with the storage of the robot at Westlake, let me know.

Norman

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Thanks so much for the offer, Norm!

In fact, since you both posted, Mark and Glenn, I’ve received an outpouring of support from Austin teams who want to make sure our far traveling fellow FIRSTers can attend. We will, without a doubt, be able to receive and store robots before TRR.

Now, we still have to see what we can do about the actually shipping costs. Perhaps there is a possibility of seeing if we can get a shipping company to donate shipping or to find some shipping sponsors. That would be pretty great.