From Oct. 6-8, the FIRST Robotics Competition subteam of Aragon Robotics attended CalGames at Woodside High School. The three-day competition featured 42 teams from high schools across California, each employing a robot designed the previous year. This was the first offseason competition of the year for FRC, which placed 17th in qualifying matches and went on to place fifth in the playoffs.
During the competition, Aragon won half of the matches they played. As a result, they entered the playoffs as a first choice team. This is the first time this has happened since 2013. During the playoffs, Aragon won their first match against two teams, and lost their second by one point. Their second and third games put them out of the playoffs.
“The performance of our bot this year was really good,” said senior and Fabrication lead Luke Phillips.
Every game consists of three stages where each team’s robot performs various tasks in order win points. The first 15 seconds of a game is known as the autonomous period, when each robot functions via a pre-programmed code. The next two minutes and 15 seconds are the teleoperation period, when the drivers of each team manually control the robot. The final 30 seconds of the teleoperation period is named the endgame period.
The Aragon team succeeded during the teleoperation period due to the performance of their drivers, sophomore George Tao and junior Adam Richter. However, their robot’s programming malfunctioned in the autonomous period, giving the team a scare.
“Our auto wouldn’t work for a little bit, but we took a breath, worked our way through it,” said fabrication lead and sophomore Giovani Viglienzoni. “[We] figured out what was wrong and fixed the issue.”
“Our auto wouldn’t work for a little bit, but we took a breath, worked our way through it”
In preparation for CalGames, the FRC team met for six and a half hours each week to practice and prepare. Co-captain and junior Marco Strassia elaborated on their efforts during this time.
“Currently we’re working on our programming, which means getting it to do more tasks autonomously,” Strassia said. “That way we can score more points. Another essential aspect which the team trained was their driving, which contributed to their success during the teleoperation period.
The competition also comes with awards for each team to apply for, which requires applicants to write essays and give a presentation. Co-captain and senior Jake Sakamoto discussed the FRC’s award goals.
“To prepare, we also have an awards team who are currently working on getting awards from the competition, such as the Founders award, the Outstanding Mentor award and possibly a finance award,” Sakamoto said.
During the event, many teams engage in scouting — a process where teams examine the other robots and teams, to see if they would like to select them to join their alliance. An alliance is a group of three teams who work together during the playoffs. The top eight teams get to choose which teams they want as a part of their alliance for the playoffs. This year, Aragon was the first choice for the seventh alliance.
“We’re working on our programming … [so] we can score more points”
The FRC team’s build season begins in January. CalGames was also a way of showcasing the products of last year’s team, who constructed the robot entered into the competition.
Correction — NOV. 12, 2023: Information regarding placement has been edited for clarity. In addition, print coverage used a photo of a robot that was not from the Aragon Robotics team.
