This past year was my first (pun intended?) year in the FRC program. I went to most of the competitions and showed up at every single meeting. One of my favorite memories, though, was marching around the Quadrangle at Battlecry @ WPI while wearing a horse mask and singing the Little Einsteins theme song with people from other teams and even WPI students. It’s silly, yes, but it was really a blast to see people who didn’t even know each other gathering to march around and sing a kids show tune.
What are some other moments that you guys would like to share?
I would like to share the afternoon of Saturday, October 17, 2015. It hasn’t happened yet, but that’s going to be the last time I expect to see Recycle Rush played.
It was chilly, spitting rain, vans and trailers were lined up to load out, when one team’s toolbox tipped and spilled onto the parking lot and sidewalk. Immediately about a dozen people, all in different t-shirts, converged on the site and made quick work of the mess. One of the girls stood up, looked around, and said, “Somebody should take a picture of this and put it on the website, because this is FIRST right here.”
When our team was in first place towards the end of day one, even though we didn’t have a working robot in any of our matches. (I am the noodle throwing human player) and had at least one 40 point match.
Our team was ranked 40/54 at the start of qualifications on the second day. We somehow jumped to 18th place with some great alliances before the end. It was fun to watch us climb up in a matter of a few hours.
Mine will be November 7th when the first match of the 2015 Rumble in the Roads kicks off. I very much enjoy running this event along side Nate Laverdure and Kyle Johnson and providing an exciting off-season event for the teams of Hampton Roads.
Implying that there were no great moments from Recycle Rush is ridiculous. You must not be a fan of FIRST. Here is my favorite, but their were many to choose from:
F2 on Einstein. The can grab battle between 118 and 987 at the start was the single best thing I saw all year. At least 10,000 people gasped at the same time. It was my first time at the world championships, and it was amazing.
This is by far my most memorable match of 2015. It is my favorite for some reasons and my least favorite for other reasons. It it QF8 of the Indiana DCMPS. In this match, our alliance had 2 full stacks on the inside of a scoring platform. on the outside of those 2 stacks, there was an uncapped half stack. with about 15-20 seconds left in the match, 292 went to cap that stack. In the process of putting the can down on the stack, they over corrected their misalignment with the stack and in the process, they knocked down 2 full stacks worth 84 points. The reason this is one of my favorite matches of the year is because at the time, all the drive teams had a sense of panic and within 2 or 3 seconds came to their senses. 292 put the can on top of the uncapped 3 stack and 234 and 1024 tried hard to bulldoze as many totes as possible onto the scoring platform. The last second effort by all three teams is probably why our alliance moved on to the next round and win the whole event. The link can be found below:
The alliance scored 106 points. We needed 92 points to move on to the next round. The last second efforts were definitely what kept us in the eliminations.
For me, it was getting to Archimedes Finals as alliance captain. Alas, no visit to Einstein this year.
Prior to this year, we had been alliance captain during official FRC events exactly twice (in ten years). This year, we were alliance captain in 3 of our 4 events.
My favorite moments:
Winning the very first Indiana District event
Being nominated for the WFA
Receiving the EI award at the Indiana State Championship
Making it to the Semi’s at CMP
Stacking all 6 Yellow Totes for Co-Op during one match
