Team 1816 had a fantastic first regional event at the Lake Superior Regional, Duluth. We were awarded the Chairman’s Award, the most prestigious award given to a FIRST Robotics team. This award places a great emphasis on the STEM outreach and inspiration performed by an FRC team; we are honored to be role models for FIRST. We will take our performance record to the World Championship event in St. Louis, April 23 – 26, 2014.
The competition itself was fun from loading-in our robot Wednesday night March 5 to taking the bus home with our friends from FRC Team 2500-Herobotics, Minneapolis on Saturday night. It was awesome to take part in the second “Double DECCer” event where 112 FIRST Robotics Teams from around the Midwest (and from as far away as Hawaii!) came to compete in the 2014 FRC Game “Aerial Assist.” The Green Machine was pleased with our qualifications record of 6-4, ranking us 16th overall. Our robot “Zeke” caught the attention of 8th seed alliance captain FRC Team 2472 – The Centurions, and we were also joined by FRC Team 93 – NEW Apple Corps. Our strong alliance finished as quarterfinalists after four exciting matches. We also were singled out by the UL Safety Advisors with an honorable mention for the UL Industrial Safety Award, for our safety culture both at the competition and in our home workshop.
We are now in the midst of getting ready to compete March 27 – 29 at the North Star event, Mariucci Arena at the University of Minnesota. Our builders have insisted on returning to build-season like hours to redesign and build a new collector mechanism after we broke ours in the last match. Our team thanks the dedication and support of our Sponsors, mentors and parents who make all of these experiences possible!