San Diego Results

Exhausted from a long battle with nearly 60 other FIRST robotics teams, Team 254 (The Cheesy Poofs) from Bellarmine College Preparatory emerged victorious at the San Diego regional robotics tournament on Saturday.

After going undefeated in all of their preliminary matches at the tournament, the Cheesy Poofs ran into trouble in the Quarterfinals when they inadvertently earned an immediate loss by red card after “damaging the field”. While slightly irritated, alliance Teams 987 and 3704 were overall very happy with the lightning agility of Bellarmine’s aptly named competition robot, Slipstream. Though the loss meant that Bellarmine would have to win the two remaining matches, driver Nick Eyre and operator Andrew Sides were confident in their abilities and the team, and were able to advance.

In the semifinal match, alliance Team 3704 received a red card after they were pushed into the opponent’s scoring zone, but polite conversation with the regional judges luckily helped to resolve the situation. Despite various obstacles, Team 254 won the regional competition, and as an added bonus took home the Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers Entrepreneurship Award. Presented for a well designed business plan, this award recognizes the aspects of robotics that do not focus on engineering. Walking away with two wins, Bellarmine robotics returns from a challenging weekend and looks optimistically forward to the Silicon Valley regional tournament.

[Article also posted on bcp.org and bellarminenews.com.]