Hello Sponsors, Friends and Fans of The Green Machine: We are pleased and excited to report that FRC Team 1816’s promotion of STEM education and our support of other FIRST teams was recognized with the Engineering Inspiration Award at the Week One FIRST Lake Superior Regional Competition! Winning this award qualifies 1816 for the World Championships in St. Louis (April 22 – 25), and as an added bonus, the EI award also carries with it a $5,000 grant from NASA to cover the competition’s registration fee.
The Lake Superior Regional competition was packed with 63 FRC teams – including The Green Machine – from around the upper Great Lakes region. FIRST teams from Minnesota, North Dakota and Wisconsin were lined up in the pits, while immediately next door in the Northern Lights competition, FRC teams from Iowa, Michigan and Wisconsin, also joined teams from Minnesota. Our robot, Zebruh, made us proud, performing reliably and with speed, agility, and accuracy, and going into quarterfinals, we were seeded fifth. Despite our best efforts, though, and the efforts of our alliance partners, we were eliminated in quarterfinals. That gave us time to rally our spirits and cheer for what ultimately became the winning robot alliance, the “Crimson Apple Herd” lead by Team 2526-Crimson of Maple Grove with Team 4818-The Herd from North Dakota and Team 93-New Apple Corps from Wisconsin!
Team 1816 is truly honored to be this year’s Lake Superior Regional Engineering Inspiration Award winner. As with all of our efforts and successes over the last 10 seasons, it would not have been possible without the generous multi-year support of our sponsors, our friends, our fans and our families. Thank you for all that you do for our team.
We will be working hard in the next several weeks to prepare for our next competition: 10,000 Lakes at the University of Minnesota, on April 2-4, 2015. We hope you will be able to stop by Williams Arena to watch us compete! Send us an email, we’d love to give you a personal tour of the event.