Does anyone know if the Kettering competition is being webcasted and, if so, where to find it?
I believe there is no webcast.
Nope, no webcast. I’m here…
However, now that I’m here, has anyone else EVER seen a 5 HOUR delay due to a pair of failed arena controllers?
Only at a kettering kickoff. It was the same year of stack attack and the problem was that team were rolling the carts over the pressure pads the human players stood on. It wasn’t 5 hours, but they did cancel matchers and proceeded to the eliminations rather than play the last handful of matches.
I see, one of the 2 Kettering Kickoffs that I didn’t attend 
Well, at least the problem looks solved. What I want to know is how they managed to rig it…
There was TV coverage about this event:
http://abclocal.go.com/wjrt/media?id=6004929
Way to go, whoever did their homework!!
Roger
I see, one of the 2 Kettering Kickoffs that I didn’t attend
Same way we control auton,disable, and normal mode… a toggle switch of course. Should be back to normal tomorrow. If not… well we deal right?
Oh, and we are not webcasting but we will be HOPEFULLY posting the entire regional on the web after the fact.
And while I’m writing, I would like to say that I have been very impressed by the level of competition I am seeing. Congratulations to all the teams and hopefully we will have a nice day tomorrow.
Ahhh yes, KK '03 - a great day to be the DJ at a competition that wasn’t competing. I completely know how the guy today felt 
:ahh::eek::mad:
So I was going to mention how huge of a disaster it was walking around for 5 hours with no competing, oh and by the way - it’s ALL MY FAULT EVERYBODY, AND I’M SORRY. I walk through the door, and suddenly the field breaks down. It must be my magnetic personality.
But anyways, it turned out not to be such a big disaster after all. It gave the rookie teams some valuable time with some VERY experienced robot inspectors to improve their robot and make it work correctly, so by the time matches FINALLY got going around 6:30 PM, pretty much every robot was working the way it was supposed to. And it turns out that with a 10 min match time, we’re only 8 matches behind. How do you like that? Tomorrow should be awesome though. Some of these rookies are outstanding.
Actually, Dan, we’re only 3 matches behind!
Wow, I have to hand it to everyone involved, the ingenuity of the people involved with F.I.R.S.T. never ceases to amaze me. However, since this field is going to be at a regional that we’re actually competing at (GLR), I hope that all of the bugs will have been worked out of it by then 
I am proud of all those rookies. We were originally on a 10-minute match schedule. By 8:00 Friday we were running 6-7 minute cycles, one after the other. They did marvelously, moving where we pushed and prodded and cajoled them to go. At about 11:00 this morning, the lead que told me we only had a couple matches to go, then rerun Match 4, 5 and 6 that were spoiled Friday afternoon. “And how many rounds did we cut out?” - none, we got all the games in. These teams got 14 rounds on the field to figure out what they can do. Watch out when they start hitting Detroit, Boilermaker, West Michigan, Great Lakes, Minnesota, Canada, and a few other places.
I’m not going to post winners, because every team there was a winner. They improved so much from Friday morning practice to Friday evening matches to the end of qualifiers this morning to exciting elimination matches this afternoon.
This event couldn’t have been put on without the help of many veteran teams. I’ll probably miss a few, and don’t feel offended, but we had students and/or mentors there from Teams 1, 33, 45, 47, 67, 70, 217, 302, 314, 322, 397, 494, 469, 830, 1025 and 1322. I also saw spectators from several other veteran teams.
Oh, it’s not just Dan’s fault. Beth Sweet also has to take some blame - she’s sure 1504 was plugged into the station that started all the problems during the finals at Midwest.
Gary, you’re officially on the bad list… :yikes:
Congratulations to all of the rookies! The caliber of teams I saw this weekend was wayyyyy above where I thought it would be! I would say over 75% of the rookies had autonomous/hybrids by the end of the tournament, and there were multiple machines doing lots of hurdling.
Congrats again to the rookies, as Gary said on the field, you guys sure as heck aren’t acting like rookies, and in our mind, you’re all vets now!
We held the all Rookie Pilot Competition for the last few days. It was held at Kettering University. All I can say is WOW. I was in awe. These teams have their acts together and us veterans had better watch out. We so wanted to webcast it but couldn’t. Even with a few bumps in the road it was amazing. Nice job all
The event was a massive sucess in my view. It gave our team much needed practice. Until stuff died, (RIP). From the first practice matches to the end of the event, teams inproved so much, that it was not funny. It was kind of scarry in the finals, every team had a real sense of what needed to be done and how to do it.
I like wise won’t post the winners because every team took so much away in the knowledge of this years game.
thnxs to the organizers
It was amazing how well designed the rookie robots were. Once they got their bugs out (after the unplanned fix-it window) they were great. We had crab, mech wheel, six wheel, four wheel, and two wheeled drives. Racing, ball lunching and claw arm robots. Robots crossing 3 and 4 line in hybrid mode. With all the help this event turned out great.
Thank you to all the teams that pitched in.
P.S. This makes the Kettering fall event a piece of cake to hold.
This is the same field that was at Midwest and will be a Detroit and Great Lakes:ahh: I want to compliant the fabulous rookies. I sat at the pit admin desk for the entire breakdown and only had 2 kids who were bored say something. They each played approx. 14 or 15 matches and 1 even released magic smoke!!! I was so blessed to be able to work with them… I made friends from all over and I hope we can do this again and again.
All I have to say is that none of the teams from the comp are rookies anymore. At least not in my eyes. They were amazing. They all had impressive robots.
I also have this to say. As I was helping que teams up, i noticed that a lot of the teams were already either on theirs way out of the pits, or already in line.
Aside from a few unfortunate robot accidents, it went smoothly.
The person in charge of queing was amazing, and I’m not just saying that because I know her. I have never heard of having a 4 hour delay, ending on time and completing all of the matches, and not adding on any extra time. It was amazing.
I can’t wait to see how they are going to perform in the next two regional. This is turning out to be a very interesting game.
this competition was great and i think this is a huge step for first in the right direction…and i dont think any of the teams pit crews were complaining about the extra time for repair i know we werent
You have to love those red tails!!!
When I see red tails I listen for that zoom you guys always did. Keep up that passion.
Best of luck to the competitors at their next competition. I saw teams that I would hate to have to play against and would like to have on an alliance. I bet some of those teams will go on the be the next generation of stunning robots out there.
I have to agree that the winner of this regional is actually every team there. They got up and showed everyone that they may be young but they can roar.
Congrats