Denver+Regional

=Back to 2009 Season= =The [|AWARDS] for the Denver Regional,= = = =The story of our second First Place title, as it took place in Denver, Colorado March 24-26= As soon as we arrived in Denver, we freshened up and hurried to meet Ms. Valerie Gates. She took the time to listen to each student as they demonstrated how robotics is inspiring and educational. The end result is - society benefits! Ms. Gates donated to Team 1332 and has motivated our students to continue to work hard and earn more funds as she will match them dollar for dollar. That was a profound opportunity for our students! It amazed me how she took the time to truly listen to each student and ask genuine questions. I am honored to have been a part of it!

The Denver March Blizzard of 2009 caused the competition to be postponed as of Thursday morning at 10:30 am. Many of us were upset! Later we were thankful as we fought through the blizzard to get into the warm and inviting Trail Dust. There we learned a few line dances, played on the slide, ate and visited with Channel 4 CBS of Denver. We enjoyed their company and the thrill of standing in the blizzard to be on TV. Brandon, Brevin, Justin and Chris continued to work hard on programming the robot.

Thursday was a busy day! We had a few practices. During practice we learned that the arena floor was different than San Diego's. The Mechanic team had to quickly raise the suspension so we could maneuver seamlessly. That included moving some bolts, and adding a temporary zip-tie. During the qualifying rounds we never dropped out of the top eight. Our mentors, Collbran Job Corps, Team 1158 were right there with us the whole time. We were even on an alliance together and we worked and played hard together. We did quite well together during the qualifying round.

On Saturday we finished the last two qualifying rounds and boy did it get exciting. Team 399 was seated number one! There robot was, wow! Simple, yet power, it moved quickly and got the job done in a smart efficient way. They were fun to watch! When team 399 announced they wanted team 1332 to be on their alliance with them our crowd gasped, we were proud! The second seated team then chooses Job Corps-Team 1158 to be on their alliance. That meant that we would now being playing for a title against our mentors. That didn’t add any stress or excitement or emotion! Our alliance then choose a rookie team, team 2996 to play defense for us.

Our alliance was teams 339, 2996 and us, 1332!

Too be continued….