Archive: Around Town

On October 18, Ithaca High School's FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Code Red Robotics Team 639 attended the local "Rah Cha Cha Ruckus" event, an off-season FIRST Robotics Competition.  A new robot is built by each FIRST Robotics team during January and February, and the official competition season is during the spring.  As this event is during the off-season and has a very relaxed competition atmosphere, it is a great opportunity for new members to experience a competition-like event, and try their hands at performing specific roles in the competition game.

Freshman rookie member, Mark Westwig says, "I was given the opportunity to drive the robot and be a human player, and it was very stressful, but very fun at the same time."

For Code Red Robotics, Rah Cha Cha Ruckus is a way to welcome new members to the team.  There were six new drivers of the robot, who drove for the vast majority of the competition and were able to experience the pressure and joy of being a part of the drive team.

"It made me wish that I joined Code Red as a freshmen, so that I could have had experiences as great as Ruckus before my senior year of high school." says rookie Neil Nicholson.  Even for those who did not drive the robot, coach the driver, or participate as the human player, Ruckus was a great way to start their time as members of the team.

"It was interesting to meet a lot of new teams, to see different ideas, and to see how other teams developed their robots." says Akshath Garg, a rookie member in his senior year at Ithaca High School.

Before the team builds this year's robot during the January-February six-week build season, they will be busy and involved in the community.  Their next event is the Family Reading Partnership Kid's Book Fest on Saturday, November 8 at Boynton Middle School.  

"This will be an astounding opportunity for the community to come see the robot functioning, talk to the team's members, and learn more about the team," according to Katie Henderson, the team's Public Relations officer.  After a busy off-season Code Red Robotics looks forward to build season when they work 28 hours per week on the next robot for spring competitions.

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