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Adventures of the Green Grinches
An All-Girl Team at the 2005 FIRST Robotics Competition
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| The Green Grinches with their robot, Max2. |
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| The Green Grinches show that you can be cool and build robots. |
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By Sonia, age 16
Girl Scout troop #1201 (The Green Grinches)
Girl Scouts—Columbia River Council
As we walked into the Memorial Coliseum in Portland, Oregon, all eight of us were nervous about how we were going to do and excited to show off our robot and get started with competition. Today was the day all our hard work was being put to the test at the 2005 FIRST Robotics competition.
As soon as we got to our pit table (a place where on-the-spot repairs can be done—kind of like a 'pit crew' in racing), we went to work on unloading our robot and decorating our area with rice lights, tool belts, and colored fabric. We are an all-girl team—one of the very few at this competition. Almost immediately after uncrating our robot, Max2, people were asking us questions about him. I guess neon pink and green and sparkle hodgepodge attracts attention.
When our turn came, four of us wheeled Max2 to the field and got set up. We put on our safety glasses and waited for the bell that signals that two drivers can step up and take control of their robots. Because this was our first year we weren't sure what to expect. We managed and for a little while we were moving around the field. Then the worst thing happened—the robot arm completely fell off. We had to stand and wait until the match was over.
At the end of the match we wheeled Max2 back to our pit to fix the arm. Then we got more bad news—the inspector found a bunch of things wrong with Max2 that would keep us from competing until we fixed them. Fortunately, another team was nice enough to come and help us out. With their help we got Max2 "up to code" and we were able to compete again.
The next two days we did all right, even though the battery kept falling off and parts of the arm fell off again. But we fixed those problems and still kept on trying. In the end we didn't get picked to go into the elimination rounds, but we did well for our first year. We still have two more years to try to get into the elimination rounds.
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