Robotics competition brings kids to Lexington for ‘the original sport for the mind.’
Run for the Robots, an international robotics competition that is a little like NASCAR, a little like basketball and a whole lot of problem-solving has taken over Alltech Arena this weekend.
The competition Friday and Saturday is offered through FIRST, which has been challenging kids through robotics since 1989.
Kentucky FIRST is hosting the event, which features 72 teams from 25 states, as well as Puerto Rico, Brazil and Kazakhstan.
“They advanced from their home state or their home county” to get there, said Kelli Gowan, executive director of Kentucky FIRST.
FIRST offers programs for kids from kindergarten through 12th grade, allowing students to progress and grow through different divisions.
The youngest kids compete with robots made from Legos through FIRST Lego League and FIRST Lego League Jr.
This weekend’s competition is part of the FIRST Tech Challenge, for 7th- through 12th-graders.
Ninth-graders through 12th graders can also compete on FIRST Robotics Competition teams.
Before the competition, each team has designed and built their own robot, which they use to toss balls in a goal basket in a game that seems vaguely like robot basketball.
Some teams have used Computer-Aided Design, or CAD, to design their robots, while Gowan said others use “cardboard-aided design.”
“They can use any material they want,” she said. “Lots of zip ties, duct tape. Every robot out here is unique.
“It’s mind-blowing what these kids can do.”
Each round lasts 2.5 minutes and involves four teams, two on each side working together.
For the first 30 seconds, the robots run autonomously based on programming the students have done ahead of time.
After that, the students take over to drive them using Xbox controllers.
Between rounds, the teams spend time in the pit area, racing to repair or refine their work much like NASCAR race teams.
Several 3D printers were set up in Alltech Arena on Friday, in case a part broke and needed to be reprinted.
“It is the original sport for the mind,” Gowan said, “where everyone can go pro.”
Greg Beasley, who competes with Firestorm, a team from Atlanta, has just completed eighth grade and said he hopes to become a mechanical engineer someday.
“I like learning about mechanical engineering,” he said. “I think this is one of the best ways to learn it.”
And, he said, “it’s good for teaching things like sportsmanship, cooperation.”
Doug Wingert, of Louisville, said there’s a place for everyone, whether they’re into designing and fabricating or working on the business and marketing side of the competition.
Wingert serves on the board of Kentucky FIRST and on the board of the Winner’s Circle Robo Jockeys, a Louisville-based FIRST Robotics Competition team.
He said he loves seeing kids find their niche on the team.
“You don’t realize how much they’re learning, because they’re inspired,” he said. “Find what inspires (them) and give them the path to run with it.”
Some of Wingert’s former team members have gone on to start their own engineering companies.
“They’re capable of designing anything, anywhere,” Wingert said. “They know from start to finish how to do it.”
Wingert also enjoys the life lessons students pick up along the way.
Because teams have to cooperate, he said students learn “gracious professionalism.” Their opponent one round might be on the same side as them the next.
And while teams can block and defend against other teams’ robots, they are not allowed to intentionally damage them.
He said his team typically has about $8,000 invested in their robot each year.
On Friday, Lloyd Stevenson-Gasol, a seventh-grader on Luminus, a team from District of Columbia International School, showed off posters, a slideshow and marketing materials, including 3D printed coins and fidget toys, that he’d made as part of the team.
“We’re a diverse community,” he said.
He’s been competing for three years now.
“My brother had joined, and I thought it would be a great idea to amplify my horizons,” Stevenson-Gasol said.
Since then, he’s decided he wants to focus on medicine for a career path, but he said “exploring new things, trying new things” as part of Luminus has been a good experience.
His teammate, ninth-grader Joseph Jardieu, said he’s been learning CAD and 3D printing lately.
“I just like putting stuff together, engineering,” he said.
