The Secret City Wildbots, Team 4265 of Oak Ridge, celebrate their second semifinals win to advance to the finals at the Smoky Mountain Regional in Knoxville on Saturday, March 25, 2017. (Photo by Angi Agle)
The Secret City Wildbots won the Engineering Inspiration Award in the Smoky Mountain Regional on Saturday, and the Wildbots, Team 4265 of Oak Ridge, will advance to the FIRST Robotics Championship in Houston on April 19.
The Wildbots had advanced throughout the day on Saturday, said Angi Agle, an Oak Ridge Board of Education member who attended this week’s robotics competition at Thompson-Boling Arena in Knoxville.
The team finished qualifying in third place, so it advanced to the quarterfinals. They won the first quarterfinal 455-273.
They tied the first semifinal round against a Hardin Valley-led alliance and then won the second semifinal against Hardin Valley, Agle said.
A third semifinal win put them into the finals.
The Wildbots lost in the finals, but the Engineering Inspiration Award sends them to the championship, Agle said.
The Secret City Wildbots competed in the FIRST Robotics “FIRST Steamworks” challenge. Their 2017 robot is named Luna.
This year’s challenge invited teams and their robots to join an adventure club and prepare their airship for flight. A press release said teams were challenged to build their robot for collecting and placing gears on their airship for their pilots (the team’s human player) to populate gear trains to start their airships rotors, and scoring fuel (“wiffleballs”) into a low goal or firing them into a high goal of their boiler in order to build up steam pressure, and lastly, climbing a rope to board their airship so they can help their pilots win the race.
The Oak Ridge Secret City Wildbots win the Engineering Inspiration Award at the FIRST Robotics Smoky Mountain Regional in Knoxville on Saturday, March 25, 2017, and advance to the national competition. (Photo by D. Ray Smith)
Jessie Pitz, in blue, feeds gears to Luna in the third round of semifinals at the Smoky Mountain Regional in Knoxville on Saturday, March 25, 2017. The Secret City Wildbots, Team 4265 of Oak Ridge, competed in the Smoky Mountain Regional this week. (Photo by Angi Agle)
Getting ready for the FIRST Robotics Competition Smoky Mountain Regional at Thompson-Boling Arena in Knoxville on Thursday, March 23, 2017. (Photo by Angi Agle)
Very proud of @frc4265 Secret City Wildbots — headed for the World Championship in Houston Apr. 19! pic.twitter.com/TgD9hL25zH
— Angi Agle (@AngiAgle) March 26, 2017
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