You would be surprised on what our FIRST robotics team, The Ratchet Rockers, could achieve in just six weeks. Six weeks referring to the start of the robotics season, which starts during Kickoff. Kickoff is the day when everyone in the world sees the challenge requirements that will allow them to compete in this year’s challenge: Stronghold. The theme is based on medieval times where you can conquer the other team’s’ castle.

“Build season,” said “N” in an eBook about the effects of FIRST by Anita Welch, “might be six of the most stressful weeks of your life, but you will definitely not regret it.”

Six weeks is all the time every robotics team in the world involved with FIRST gets to have to build two robots: one to compete with and one to practice with. But before that can happen the robot must be made on 3D software to manage more time, so while some students made the 3D models of the robots, other build team members built a replica of the competition field to practice on. You’d be impressed to also know that our team built all two robots and the field in under six weeks first competition and left their first competition having gotten as far as semifinals. But it wasn’t easy, and the good natured attitudes of most the team made winning possible.

“I can tell you for a fact that if everyone was mean and rude and, like, negative there’s no way I’d still being doing robotics right now,” commented Maya Angeles, a freshman drifter one the team.

Being around everyone in an old gym for 5 to 12 hours a day, six days a week can take a toll on anybody, which is why many newer students were worried about going into build season. But due to the close quarters and long hours, everyone became close to one another. For some members, like Angeles, it took her longer to get involved with everyone.

“One of my regrets is not getting to know the people sooner than I did and not getting involved with them in the beginning of build season,” said Angeles.

But while build season can be incredibly stressful as teams scramble to make their prototypes and piece their competition robot together, competition season is much more laid back. For countless teams their first competition doesn’t go so hot as they work out the kinks in their competition robot, which they aren’t allowed to touch once the last day of build season is up. We were no exception.

“Everyone can always do more,” said Joey Flynn, a second year programmer. “But everything is always breaking, so that makes [competition] hard.”

Flynn and other members of the team grew quickly frustrated during their first competition in St. Louis when several small errors caused the robot to fail and shut down during most of their qualification rounds.

“We were kind of upset about how St. Louis turned out,” said Angeles.

Even so, The Ratchet Rockers used their new awareness to their own advantage in their second competition which earned them much more attention from other teams and even a local news station, who videotaped their pit with students working on the robot. Already The Ratchet Rockers’ presence at the Rocket City Regional was at a better start than at the St. Louis Regional.

The drive to Huntsville took about eight hours and was a hard pill for many of the more active members to swallow. Luckily team 1706 left at seven in the morning and arrived at about four in the afternoon. Most kids were tired enough to sleep for most of the journey, but some stayed up and chatted, played games, or watched Netflix.

“We played cards against humanity, castle crashers, we watched Forest Gump and the Bee Movie,” said team member Jacob Clark, a member of Computer-Aided Design (CAD)department, when asked about what he did on the bus ride. “There was lots of yelling [and] laughing.”

When the team finally arrived at the Hampton Inn many of the members, now well rested and ready for the day, were sent up to their rooms with the encouragement to settle in for the night and sleep well to be ready to leave at 6:30 in the morning for competition. However, many of the students, like Flynn, stayed up playing games on a Wii that one of the robotics students had brought with them. Other kids stayed up playing Call of Duty on an Xbox that was also brought along, goofing around, or just talking to one another.

“[I loved that] CAD team [bunked] together,” said Seth Tate, a CAD team member who enjoyed the rowdy nature of his friends.

Many of the students woke up tired and the days were long. From six in the morning to 11 at night The Ratchet Rockers spent their days in Alabama mostly in the arena watching the competition, working in the pits, or making the most out of their trip. Of course, learning from their mistakes the Ratchet Rockers did much better at their second competition and were invited to the final rounds.

“I felt ecstatic,” stated Angeles when asked about how she felt about the Ratchet Rockers being chosen to go into finals, “because it didn’t think we’d get picked for an alliance, especially in Alabama with all of the really good teams. We had a chance at making it to worlds… which was really cool.”

The odds were highly in favor of the Ratchet Rockers losing quickly, but due to the effort, skill and cooperation of the drive team, their alliance made a valiant fight and tied twice before succumbing to their competition. This achievement still didn’t appease many of the members who had wanted to win it and go to the World Championships, however.

“[I felt] disappointed, because we didn’t win,” said Tate when asked about how he felt on his team making it to the quarterfinals.

His opinion was shared by many of his fellow team members.

“Alabama was a crazy competition with so many good teams,” commented Clark. “And it was awesome that we got into finals, [but] I’m kinda bummed that we didn’t make it farther.”

Yet their mentors saw a different side of the matter and brought up the fact that many of the teams were older and more technologically advanced than the Ratchet Rockers, which gave the other teams an unbeatable advantage. Of course the students understand that advancements and older teams are more inclined to win the finals, but they were disappointed nonetheless when they only made it as far as quarterfinals.

“They played with some of the best teams in the world and gave them a run for their money,” commented Mr. Redman, a mentor for the team.

Beating their record from St. Louis, at Huntsville the Ratchet Rockers also won an award. The Spirit Award. Most of the kids were surprised, because due to the seating arrangements and the overall setup of the room, most of the cheering and festive dance battles had to be halted so that way everyone attending could see the competition field.

“When we got the spirit award in Alabama it was a shocker to all of us, because we didn’t think we’d be getting it,” said Angeles.

While in Huntsville many neat expeditions were made by the team, such being invited by NASA, a big supporter of FIRST, to see their Rocket Center and have dinner under the Saturn V. NASA’s Rocket Center also had a two-ride amusement park and an interactive museum that was open to the students to go look at while they were there.

“[The best part about NASA was] seeing the rocket that was outside,” said Nathan Laws, an electrical division member.

Overall the team had a great season thus far, both in building their robot, named Master Key, and competing with it. Our team has another competition coming up on the 14th of May in Sedalia, MO, at Smith-Cotton High School. This competition is hosting the best FIRST robotics teams in Missouri, so it is bound to be a worthwhile event. Everyone is invited to come and cheer them on.