We attended the East Super Regional competition in Scranton, Pennsylvania two weekends ago. The competition, which lasted from Friday the 18th to Sunday the 20th, was lots of fun and a good opportunity for us to connect with other teams. Although we had a great experience, we had to persevere through many challenges in order to get our robot running well.
On Friday, we checked into our hotel, which was a lovely Microtel in Dixon City. The owner was fascinated with FIRST and took a picture with us and our blue wigs. We then headed over to the competition center at the University of Scranton and set up our pit area. We had a ten by ten tent frame which we outlined in LEDs. We passed inspection and went through judging.
Saturday was a lot more trying for us. During our first three matches, we faced static problems and disconnect every match. It was hard to keep our morale, but we kept at it and we finally solved the problem by downgrading from a beta version of the software. Suddenly, our robot started working like normal again! In our last qualification match, we even missed the national record by seven points (we got 527 points)! We also made many friends throughout the day. The ice cream social that night was fun, however we were a little sad that the music was stopped for most of the time because of a magician’s show.
Sunday was our last day, but we still had lots of energy to last us throughout the end of the competition. We ended our qualification matches in ninth place and we were the first pick of the second seeded alliance, which consisted of our captain, Sab-BOT-age (#7314) and the Robotic Doges (#8645). We won the division semi-finals, but unfortunately did not win the division finals. During the awards ceremony, we received three awards, including division finalist alliance, first place Connect Award, and third place Inspire Award! We’re thrilled to be moving onto the World Championship in St. Louis and we can’t wait to see you all there! Good luck to all teams!
Gearticks 