Rookie All Star Award: Biggest Rush of 2009
I don’t often seek out risky situations that might bring forth a rush of adrenaline. I do enjoy a good roller coaster from time to time, but didn’t go on any this year that I can remember. Thinking back, my big rushes tend to be brought on by accomplishments, like after a big test, performance, or competition. This year’s rush came at a Robotics Competition in April.
Last year between January and March a significant portion of my “free time” was given to a high school robotics team competing for the first time in the First Robotics Competition. The K-Botics team started as a group of students who were interested, but had no ideas how to build a robot. Early in January, the NASA webcast brought us all together to learn about a new game of 3-on-3 robot basketball played on ice.
No, really! It’s called “Lunacy”, and it was created to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the moon landing.
This is the video that we were shown at kickoff last year.
We went quickly from learning the rules of the game, to designing a strategy, and prototyping possible robots. Over the six weeks of build season (every evening and all day Saturdays), we created not only a fantastic robot, but also a cohesive team of students and mentors. It is a treat to work with such dedicated individuals! We shipped the robot off, and later joined it at the Greater Toronto Regional (GTR) the largest regional competition in Canada. The top alliance of 3 teams would head off to the Worlds in Atlanta, along with the winner of the Chairman’s Award and the Rookie All-Star Award. We had submitted a thick report detailing our plan for this year, our plan for the future, our involvement in the community, and lots of pictures of us and the robot.
Here is a video of us (team 2809) in the semifinals at the GTR competition. We didn’t get any farther in the competition….
But….and here comes the moment of the RUSH….at the end of the weekend’s competition, the speeches were given to announce the Rookie All-Star winners. We were sitting together in the stands, with eyes closed and fingers crossed, hoping that we’d be named. What a rush it was (as you can hear in the video) to be called down to the floor, and be recognized for the many hours of hard work, and great accomplishments of the season.
Even though we went on to Atlanta (having an excellent BUS RAVE on the way) and won an award at the Worlds, I still count this win at GTR as the biggest rush…maybe it is because it was our first. Stay tuned for more robotics fun this January!
Tags: best of 2009, robotics
