The 2013 Season

The 2013 FIRST season was another landmark year for the team. The AdamBots started the season out strong, winning the 2013 Safety Animation Award for an extraordinary animation. The AdamBots were pleased to gain two new sponsors in the 2013 season, R&G Drummer and Magna Powertrain AG. The team built one of their smallest robots to date, “Persephone”, to account for Ultimate Ascent’s unique pyramid structures and hanging requirements. The AdamBots continued to mentor FRC Team LamBot 3478, and met with them in St. Louis, Missouri, at the FIRST Championship.

Build Season

For information regarding the progress on building our robot, you can visit the FIRST 2013 Build Season page in the Media Gallery.

View Build Season Pictures

Palmetto Regional Event

At 4 pm on Tuesday February 27, 2013, the AdamBots left for their first competition of the 2013 FIRST season, the Palmetto Regional, in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. On Friday, the qualification matches began. In all, we won six and lost two matches. We had to replay one match because of a technical issue.  We were selected by team 11, Team M.O.R.T., in the 3rd alliance slot.  Together, we selected team 2187, Team Volt.  As an alliance, we won our quarter-final matches, semi-final matches, and finally, the finals matches.  We also held the highest scores of the competition as well as the highest score in the world (for a time), 166 points. This was a very successful competition for the AdamBots, Team M.O.R.T., and Team Volt.

Grand Blanc District Event

Coming from a win at the Palmetto Regional, we were excited to try our chances in a Michigan District event, especially one that got as competitive as the Grand Blanc District. By the end of qualification rounds, after 12 intense matches, we were ranked 6th overall. We were eventually picked as the 2nd robot in the 2nd alliance, led by team 2619, the Charge, who also picked team 3302, the Turbo Trojans, to finish the alliance. We won both the quarter- and semi-finals and were extremely excited to have made it to the final. We were extremely happy to be named runners-up at the award ceremony, and for winning the Entrepreneurship Award!

Troy District Event

The Troy District event was a very intense competition and the outcome was great, as we won the Quality Award and the finals, taking home champions medals along with teams 469 and 4377! The qualification matches were exciting, and by the end, we were ranked 5th with 9 wins and 3 losses. For the elimination rounds, we were picked by the second-ranked team, 469, Las Guerrillas from International Academy, and our alliance was rounded out by team 4377, Boyne City Blaze. We won our first quarter final match 155-81 and our second 160-84, knocking out the #7 alliance and moving to the semi-finals. We then won the semi-finals 160-64 and 147-92, making it to the finals. We won our first finals match 175-95, and took home the title after winning the second match 140-91.

 Michigan State Championship

The Michigan State Championship was an intense competition as always, with 64 of the best Michigan teams competing for the champion’s medals. In the end, we did very well, making it into the quarter finals of the elimination matches along with teams 2000, TEAM ROCK, and 3656, the Dreadbots. We were very happy to make it as far as we did in such a rigorous competition, and our experience was made even better by an appearance by Michigan governor Rick Snyder, and by our winning of the Industrial Design Award sponsored by General Motors.

World Championship

At the Edward Jones Dome in St. Louis, we were thrilled to compete in the 2013 FIRST World Championships, where 400 robots shot discs and climbed pyramids to conquer the challenge of Ultimate Ascent. We finished as quarter-finalists in the Galileo Division as leaders of the 8th alliance. There was, as always, some great swag in the pits and we were able to talk to some great people from the hundreds of teams as well as dozens of representatives from companies & colleges. By the end of the qualification rounds, we had won 6 games and lost 2, putting us at 11th position for alliance selection.

In our first elimination match we were, admittedly, the underdogs- facing the #1 seeded alliance comprised of teams 118, the first seed, 1114, the second seed, and 4039, the 23rd seed. In the first match we lost 213-170. However, we were extremely excited when we won our second game 166-148 thanks to some awesome defense. We gave the #1 alliance a run for their money in the third match also, but unfortunately we lost it by  record-breaking score of 288-186.

The awards between finals matches ended a superb FIRST season. We were thrilled to see our sister team in Mexico, team LamBot 3478, take home the Engineering Inspiration Award. They definitely deserved it and we are happy to have such a close relationship with such a committed and spirited team. We hope to see them back at the Championship again next year.

Brief Recap

• FIRST Safety Animation Award (see the animation here)

Palmetto Regional

• Champions

Grand Blanc District

• Entrepreneurship Award
• Finalists

Troy District

• Quality Award
• Champions

Michigan State Championship

• Industrial Design Award Sponsored by General Motors
• Quarter Finalist

World Championship

• Quarter Finalist – Galileo Division

Off-Season Events

• Finalists – MARC Competition
• Champions – Michigan Science Center Competion
• Champions – Bloomfield Girls Robotics Competition
• Quarter Finalists – Indiana Robotics Invitational Competition