The very start
Now that the first tournament of this project “the regionals” is over, gone, dusted we have to make a what I assume to be a pretty long post for how long the setup was for the tournament was so I’m going to get into it. To start things off in I think December we got our challenge types and teams where we met all our team mates and started planning. We had about 30 minutes to look over the rules and see the dimensions that we needed for the item. Now I haven’t exactly told you what challenge option my team and I got, we got probably the most fun challenge engineering. For engineering this year we had to make a launching device that launches a pretty heavy bean bag about 14 oz so kinda heavy. To make this device we had a budget of $200 to buy all of the materials including props and materials to build with, plus paints.

The grim reality of meeting up.
A couple months into the project our group had to meet up regularly to build the device and make props. Now I missed a lot of the meeting because I was sick A LOT but at the very end a few weeks before I did come to the meetings and dress rehearsals. At these meetings I was told that they made the modular device and some other important props during these meeting’s but I really couldn’t do anything about it seeing that I was on the verge of death. Plus one of the times was a dress rehearsal that was at the school and was kind of disappointed that I couldn’t come and help. Now taking place a little more than half way way to the tournament which was on a Saturday taking up the entire day which I was not very thrilled about that but I’m going to talk about that later. Now things were getting serious, one of our group members created a script for all of us and luckily I only had 4 lines :).

Scripts and robots.
Now about a week or two after getting our lines one of our group members said we had to miss the tournament to go to another tournament this time for skiing and I had to take the burden of his lines. Now up to six lines with 8 sentences which was very disappointing seeing now that I had to memorize a whole new set of lines. Now with little less than a month until the tournament I actually was free of my relentless sickness and started coming to meetings. In said meeting I worked on memorizing lines and cutting cardboard to make props. When mostly other members of the team started working on the robot costume it was short but complex task. Having to gather a big cardboard box and paint the entire thing then putting cool decorations on it like a ball that lights up when turned on which was pretty cool.
The big day
After months of planning and practicing lines it was finally time for the tournament. For my costume I had to wear all white and a dress shirt that I wasn’t too thrilled about seeing that I had to dig it out of my closet. Now arriving at school at 8:30 AM ON A SATURDAY I was very tired and hadn’t memorized all my lines so I had one last run through and it went well. Now with about 30 minutes to go we had to move our props into the room where we were presenting we had time too watch the first team go which was interesting to say the least. Now finally going up and presenting to the appraisers the final presentation and I think we did pretty well.
The verdict
Now with our presentation being at 9:40 am and the award show being at 2:30 we had just under five hours of doing completely nothing. When it got to around 11:00 am my friends and I went to go have lunch then go play soccer which was amusing. Then after just walking around for a couple of hours we all had to go to the gym to see who won in each division. In engineering and rest of the challenges there was 2 classes intermediate and senior, senior being the older kids. After waiting a while they finally got around to engineering and you won’t believe if I told you. We got first place which was very cool. So finally I got to go home around 3:00 pm and finally get some rest.














