Congratulations to freshman Conner Piegaro, leader of the Blue Alliance. Our school’s robot “BB” ranked second out of the 25 teams competing at Belen Jesuit Preperatory School. At the end of regular play, we stood near the top with three wins and one tie. During the playoffs, Conner put together the winning trio of teams, made from PiraTech from Palm Beach High School in Melbourne, Carrollton School of the Sacred Heart in Miami, and Seminole SECME from Seminole Ridge High School in Loxahatchee. The Blue Alliance advanced to the finals and won the best two out of three (the final game score was 47 to 11).
VEX Round Up is played on a 12’x12’ square field and two alliances – one “red” and one “blue” – composed of two teams. Each alliance competes in matches consisting of a twenty-second autonomous period, where the robot follows preprogrammed commands from its onboard microprocessor. This followed by two minutes of driver directed play via radio controller. The object of the game is to attain a higher score than your opponent alliance by placing tubes upon goalposts, owning goalposts, and by low hanging or high hanging from the ladder.
(right: Seminole SECME student Conner Piegaro controls the BB bot during the Miami VEX Round Up tournament on October 23, 2010 at Belen Jesuit Preparatory School.) Giving SECME students the opportunity to work with the VEX robotics systems promotes education in the areas of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) and teaches critical life skills such as teamwork, project management and problem solving.
The 2011 VEX Robotics World Championship is the final event in the 2010-2011 VEX Competition season. Winning teams from local and state VEX Robotics Competitions will have the opportunity to meet in Florida and compete against other top-ranked teams from around the world, playing the game VEX Round Up. The World Championship will be held at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex at the Walt Disney World® Resort near Orlando, Florida on April 14-16, 2011. Coinciding with National Robotics Week, the three-day tournament unites top middle school, high school and college robotics teams from around the world to celebrate their accomplishments and further inspire students to pursue careers in robotics and other STEM related fields.
Scoring Guide 
Conner Piegaro and his father Tony work on BB 
Palm Bay HS PiraTech 508 
Seminole SECME Bomb Bot 
(l. to r.: Erich Landstrom; Rick Folea, SE VEX Regional Manager; and Conner Piegaro)Montgomery Gentry - Something To Be Proud Of
Like most overnight success stories this was the result of 3 years of effort. But still, I did not expect to come in first place at our first tournament!!! We have a lot of work to do to get ready for World Championship in spring.
ReplyDeleteBut I do want to say:
One student made the difference. If he did not show, we would not have competed.
One second made the difference. In one round, our alliance won because literally in the last second of play, our partners dropped the ring that won us that match on the goal post.