Team Overdrive went to the Diamond State FVC competition at the University of Delaware on January 27th, 2007.  Some of us stayed at a hotel the night before the match.  One of the things we wanted to accomplish was rotating our robot drivers and having all of the team members gain additional experience.  The other goal was to see how good Max really was and get to see him in his prime condition. Our nerves were tested at once!  We almost didn't make it past the robot sign in and inspection. Once we got in, however, we set up our pit area and drove during some of the practice rounds. Then we went to see the judges and tell them about our robot. They were very nice when we were presenting and seemed impressed with our laboratory notebook and engineering designs.

After a successful judging session, we went to our pit area and prepared Max for the competition. The opening ceremonies were impressive and we enjoyed learning about FLL and Nano technology. We also were excited about the competition and our chances at another Think award.

We went through qualifying rounds with only 2 breakdowns - one in the autonomous mode due to the "wings" on the basket getting caught on the goal and us sitting there the rest of the game.  The other was caused by an unknown malfunction where the robot jerked and didn't respond to user controls. We won our first qualifying match 60 > 12.  The second match was when we had our first malfunction, but our alliance partners helped pull us through.  We won the match with a close score of 17 > 15. We came back in our third match with a 69 > 3 victory! Our fourth match we won 71 > 17, but in our 5th match the robot broke down.  We had 7 balls in our basket and were ready to dump when something went wrong. We lost in an aggravating 14 < 77 game. Sometimes, when you just can't figure it out, you have to leave it in God's hands. Our loss proved costly as we placed 8th after the tie-breaking procedures.

We were not prepared for this situation in our scouting process.  All of the teams we had planned on picking for our alliance partners were picked by other teams. When it was time for us to pick, Gina picked team NORSTAR whom she hadn't scouted personally - it was a spur of the moment thing. They accepted and thanked us while the other teams were choosing their second picks. She then had to rely on her brain and memory as she had no other teams which she was prepared to select.  She scanned the line of team representatives and recognized Team Blue Crew as being a good team.  They graciously accepted. All 3 teams met to discuss strategy and decide which teams would play first. We told them that we were already going to Atlanta, but we would try to get them there too.

Our alliance was playing in the latter quarterfinals and we won the first match, lost the second, and won the third. We moved on to the semifinals where there was some tough competition. We lost our first match 30 < 99.  It was a heart-breaking loss, but we gathered ourselves together afterwards and got ready for the next game. It was make it or break it time. We left it all on the field as Max put load after load of balls into the goals. Then, with the clock ticking down to its last seconds, we realized that the opposing alliance had the atlas ball and, if they kept it, we would lose. We went for it. What we realized later on was that if we had gotten more balls in the goal or had gone to hang, we could have won it even with them having the atlas ball. But right then, it was time for the trick play. We drove up to the Atlas ball that all the robots had cornered. We started to lift our basket and spin the wheels out in what Mr. Shotyk invented as the "push the atlas ball out of the arena" maneuver.  People watched in anticipation as the nerves of the team built up.  When they realized what we were trying to do, even the referees were cheering for us! We tried to push and lift and spin, but it was a move we hadn't practiced in a while. Max was doing exactly what we were telling him to do, but it wasn't quite accurate.  Our basket went way up but the ball was not with it. We tried to get the basket down, but it was caught on the ball making one of our lifting mechanisms not work. We tried and tried and couldn't even back out.  Our wheels weren't on the ground -our chassis was. We were stuck and helpless as the clock ticked down and our hopes went with it. We lost that game too in a close 29 < 39 score.  The opposing alliance went on to the finals and we went back to the pit area with Max, thanking our alliance partners for playing with us. It was a hard thing to do, watching the finals, but we did it with gracious professionalism and open eyes, watching the teams compete and have fun. Alliance 2 won the competition and we commend their teams' efforts and robots. We still had a chance at winning something so we waited patiently for the awards ceremony.

We applauded and cheered as team 3501 received the Innovate award and walked off the field. The next award was the Think award and we knew if we were to win any of the awards, we wanted this one. We had spent so much time and effort on our engineering notebook that even the judges commented that we had "daily entries that demanded the collaboration of all team members." It surprised and excited us when we heard the announcer quote the judges: "As a first year team, this group of students exhibits all the qualities of this award." Team 3179 Team Overdrive is the winner of the Think award! The Amaze award was given to Teams 2046 & 2052 for traveling halfway around the world from Singapore! The Connect award was given to team 3370 for their connection with their community. And finally, the Inspire award was given to team 1712 for their demonstration of gracious professionalism and robot design. Congratulations to all the teams who won awards.  You all deserve them.

When we thought about it and talked it over in our next meeting, we decided that we were grateful for the things we were able to do in Delaware, and for our second Think award! We also thought we needed to improve on our strategy and scouting in future competitions. It was another fun, exciting, and dramatic competition for Team Overdrive!!