The Off Season


At the 11th of December 2009, Steampunk got to Emek Hefer with many more of the Israeli teams. We woke up at 5 AM because we had to be there at 7:00. After arriving we organized our pit and started to work on the robot and the program. Couple of hours later the games started, and we were the first o play.

As in the championship there were 2 stages: the preliminaries, where all teams are competing each other, and the second stage, where the best 8 teams pick 2 others which will play with them in the same alliance.

Unluckily, a single day before the off season a LabVIEW update had been released, and our programming crew had to write the whole program from the beginning, what caused many problems, such as a disabled joystick. Therefore, we were not 1 of the best 8 teams, and we weren't picked. Of course we took it all proportionally and tried to help other team, as much as we could, if they needed help.

In addition to the technical side of the event, the social side was very dominant. because of the fact that many of the Israeli teams came to play in the off season the atmosphere was incredible. We knew many new people, some of them are from rookie team, and gave them our phone number, in case would need help, or just would want to come to Ra'anana to work or train with us.

When it was all through, and teams started to leave, we stayed in the arena and helped the local team, Emek Hefer, to organize some equipment.

6 days before the off season, in a Saturday morning, we hosted a 'systems preparing and supporting day in our school, for all of the teams who were about to come to the big event, in aspiration to prevent optional faults and problems. As a Beta team, and the last year's Beta team we felt obligated to provide this kind of help and support. We hosted 4 teams in our school and lab for a productive, effective and funny day.