Team 1706 : First Robotics Competition 2008

The First Robotics Competition (FRC) was held this weekend. Our regionals were at the Family Arena right here in St. Charles. Teams all across the country competed in the game 'Overdrive' on Friday and Saturday. Our team, 1706, had a very respectable showing especially considering the fact that we are a young team with a very limited budget. (Here is a link to some recent news stories about the competition.)

We heard that some teams had budgets in excess of $100,000; I heard of one that was over $150,000! (By comparison our budget was $7,000.) Some of the robots were built by technical schools where the entire student body was involved and had access to incredible facilities.

What I felt was the most amazing robot, at least based on software, was the team 148 machine. It was able to perform two revolutions of the track, avoiding other robots in the way, in fully autonomous mode. When I spoke to one of the team mebers I learned the software was written by an engineer who had been competing in FRC for 19 years and was now in his sixties! As amazing as that is, you gotta wonder how are a handful of high school students with limited budget, resources, time, and facilities going to be able to compete at that level.

The matches themselves were simply amazing. I recorded all of the final matches on video tape and hope to transfer them online at a later date.

Another fascinating aspect of our robot competition this year is the fact that PBS is doing a two hour documentary about First Robotics. Out of the over one thousand robotics teams five were chosen to be profiled and, it just so happened, that my son's team, 1706, was one of the teams selected. On Saturday evening the team went out to a local restaurant to celebrate their success. The 35 of us took over a massive portion of the packed restaurant and when it came to give speeches and thank yous we were surrounded by a film crew. It was a surreal experience and I took pride in explaining to curious people in the restaurant what it was all about.

Here is a short news story about the documentary feature:

National FIRST Robotics Competition Sets the Stage for Five Teams of Students, Including Group From Wentzville’s Timberland and Holt High Schools

In January, KETC/Channel 9, the St. Louis public television station, began production of FIRST Robotics Competition: 2008 (working title), a two-hour documentary scheduled for broadcast nationally on PBS in late 2008 or early 2009. KETC received full funding for the project from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). It is being shot and edited in high definition.

The program will follow the experiences of five groups of high school students from around the country as they engineer, build and operate robots to compete in regional and national FIRST robotics tournaments. The FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Robotics Competition began in 1992 with 28 teams; today it attracts over 37,000 students on 1,500 teams from eight countries in this “varsity sport of the mind.”

For the national documentary, a KETC production team has been following a group of competitors from Wentzville’s Timberland and Holt high schools; they’ve named themselves Ratchet Rockers. Each team is given six weeks to build their robot from a kit of common parts provided by FIRST. The robots will compete in the St. Louis regional contest to be held February 28–March 1 at the St. Charles Family Arena. The St. Louis regionals will host 43 teams from 12 states; the St. Louis area alone is contributing 14 teams from 29 high schools. Winners will move on to the nationals April 17–19 in Atlanta , Georgia .

Not only will the documentary explore the technical challenges faced by the students, but it will show them negotiating obstacles from daily life, including a lack of funds, personal rivalries, immigration requirements, physical ills and family problems. In addition to the Wentzville team, the documentary will profile an all-girls team from Baltimore ; a team from Idaho headed by a young man with Muscular Dystrophy; a team from a youth corrections facility in Colorado ; and a first generation Chinese student on a team from Seattle who must battle his non-English-speaking parents to let him participate.

“Through our production of FIRST Robotics Competition: 2008, KETC is bringing recognition of our region’s expertise in science and technology to a national audience and at the same time highlighting the Saint Louis Science Center, the competition’s local sponsoring organization, and many community-minded corporate supporters,” said KETC President and CEO Jack Galmiche . “This cooperative effort across so many platforms—educational, cultural, scientific, engineering and technological organizations—demonstrates St. Louis ’ continuing role in innovation, and Channel 9’s role in showing the world that innovative spirit.”