December Team Blast

Whew!  The MASTERPIECE season is flying by!  We are looking forward to our two Semi-State Competitions at Purdue Fort Wayne and The University of Southern Indiana, and are grateful to both Universities for hosting these large events.  Eighteen teams will advance from each event to the State Championship, which is scheduled for January 20 at Westfield High School.  One team will advance from there to the World Festival in Houston in April. 
We also have a few invitations to Opens/Invitationals in Brazil, Florida and Massachusetts for our top placing teams.  You can find more information about those in this email.

We have an opportunity for teams who either didn’t compete or didn’t advance to Semi-State this season, we will have an off-season Spring Fling event, you can find those details below.

FIRST Tech Challenge Season competitions begin this month, we encourage you and your teams to check out the action in our 7-12 grade program at a competition near you.  For a more FIRST Tech Challenge event information, visit https://www.firstindianarobotics.org/ftc/events/.

There has been a lot of conversation around Mission 14:  Audience Delivery, and FIRST recently issued an update regarding this mission.  You can read all of the season updates here.  More specific information is included in this email.

There will not be a coaches call in December, so if you have any questions or need assistance, please reach out to me anytime.  I can be reached via email at tthompson@firstindianarobotics.org or you can schedule a call with me using this link.

Have a safe and happy holiday season,

Trisha

Spring Fling Event

We are excited to offer an additional FIRST LEGO League Challenge competition opportunity.  The Spring Fling is open to teams who didn’t advance to Semi-State, or did not compete in the fall season.  It will be held in conjunction with our FIRST Robotics Competition (9-12 grade) State Championship on Saturday, April 6, 2024 at Lafayette Jefferson High School from 10 am – 2:00 pm ET, and will include 3 robot runs and a modified judging session.  If your team would like to participate, please fill out this form: https://forms.gle/ZCDUdJkP2zRqmRH68

Open Invitations

The FIRST LEGO League Challenge MASTERPIECE season doesn’t end with the Indiana State Championship!  We have some opportunities for teams to participate in some great Opens and Invitationals in the post season.  These opportunities are allocated based on performance at State, but we wanted to share this information now, so that hopeful teams can start thinking about fundraising!  Indiana currently has invitations to the following events:

  • World Festival, Houston, Texas (1)
    • April 17-20, 2024
  • FLL International Open Brazil, powered by SESI (1)
    • August 1-4, 2024
  • Florida Sunshine Invitational (1)
    • June 19-23, 2024
  • FLL Worchester Polytechnic Institute Open Invitational (1)
    • Worcester, MA
    • June 7-9, 2024

As the season continues, we may receive other invitations, and certainly more information about existing invitations.  Registration costs for these events can vary, but is typically in the $1500 range.  This amount does not include transportation, food, or lodging.

For those who haven’t heard, last summer was the final Razorback Invitational.  It was a wonderful event for teams who were lucky enough to attend, but sadly those organizers have moved on to other things.  There are many groups who are planning new and exciting events that hope to be as popular as Razorback, and we look forward to those events!

Mission 14 Update
(November 28th, 2023)

UPDATE 09 – DURING THE MATCH: OUTSIDE HOME #4 | COMBINING WITH A MISSION MODEL – As stated in During the Match: Outside Home 4, If a mission model is combined with anything (including the robot), the combination must be loose or simple enough that, if asked to, a technician could immediately free the mission model in perfect original condition. For the remainder of the season, the word “immediate” will mean if this condition can be met in one single motion. Points scored using combinations that fail this test will not count.

Further Clarification:

Question:  Can you clarify? Is it one motion per item attached to a mission model or is it one motion for everything attached to a mission model?  One single motion 4x in a single mission model is okay?

FIRST HQ Answer:  This is treated on an individual basis. 1x per mission model. Since each audience member is an individual mission model, they must be treated individually.

Question:  If there are 3 audience members attached to the pedestal. Is it a motion per audience member or one motion for all audience members?

FIRST HQ Answer:  One motion per combination. It may be one pedestal, but it is 3 combinations in that instance because each mission model combination is treated on an individual basis.

Semi-State Tournaments

If you still need to pay your $75 registration fee, you can pay by credit card or generate an invoice at https://pay.firstindianarobotics.org/

1) Select “FLL Challenge Semi-State Registration”
2) Type in your team number
3) Click “Add to Cart” (If you have multiple teams, you can change the team number and add multiple registrations to your cart.)
4) From here you can checkout via credit card, or select “Print an Invoice” (You can also download a copy of our W-9 from this screen) You can print a paper copy of your invoice, or print to pdf to email a copy.
  • Before your event, make sure your team has coach 1 and coach 2 cleared through YPP, no exceptions.  You also will need to get all of your students registered in the FIRST dashboard (www.firstinspires.org).  Please print your roster from your dashboard and bring it to the Semi-State Tournament.  You will need it to check in.  You can find detailed instructions on team member registration here:  https://www.firstinspires.org/resource-library/youth-registration-system
  • Internet access at Qualifying Tournaments varies and is not guaranteed.  We recommend teams download the SPIKE app, rather than working from the web version.
  • For those using school-issued devices:  If you have internet access, you may have trouble connecting.  It is recommended that you backup all of your programs, or print hard copies.  You can find more information here:  https://primelessons.org/en/ProgrammingLessons/BackingUpFiles.pdf

State Championship

Exciting news!  Thanks to the generosity of our sponsors, there will be no registration fee for teams who advance to the Indiana FIRST LEGO League State Championship!  The State Championship will be held Saturday, January 20 at Westfield High School.

Missed a Team Blast?

All of our emails are posted on our blog at: firstindianarobotics.org/blog/

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