Severe Acute Mars Syndrome goes to State

Minnesota State First Lego League Championship

Jan. 23 and 24 2004

Friday Night

Michael changes the batteries.

Sean helps?

Leslie waits for the team's attention.

Jack shows Tarek the effects of an explosion on Mars.

Amelia waits for her cue to read. The robot "Fido" sits awaiting rescue. Behind Amelia is the team's practice table, which leans against the front windows.

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"Can you give us an external temperature reading?" Tarek and Jack practice SAMS' presentation of the Rover Rescue Mission.

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Jack "woop-woop"s. Amelia and Leslie (reading for Lisa) read lines from inside the "Lassie" rover. A living room is a great place for practicing.

Saturday

8:10 am. The team practices, 20 minutes before the Technical Judging.

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A passing team says, "Way Cool!" as the SAMS team practices adding housing modules in a V.

Division 2, Group B Technical Judging begins with a description of the ground rules.

SAMS shows off the first mission: retrieve 3 ice cores from the crater. Success!

SAMS prepares to move the rover off the sand dune. Missions to drop the gate, clear dust off the solar panel, launch the red ball, and add two habitation modules have already been run.

Jack, Amelia, and Lisa describe their programs to the judge.

Meanwhile, Sean, Tarek, and Michael (not shown here) describe their robot for the Robust and Innovative judges.

His judging form almost complete, the judge asks another question.

9:14 am. Amelia and Lisa in Space Camp jump suits prepare to enter the "Lassie" robot retriever. This is the Research, Presentation, and Teamwork judging.

10:10 am. First run at the competition tables. A microphone overload causes Jack and Michael to cover their ears. Their robot is ready to run.

Fred Rose (Mr. hightechkids.org) watches the team. He expects great things from the SAMS team that placed first in the first regional event of the year.

Unfortunately a minor difference in the positioning of the table's red and black mat causes the robot's arm and hook to tip over the ice cores. Michael sees it, Jack doesn't. Jack's busy putting together the housing modules. Everything else goes perfectly. The team's score of 290 puts them into first place.

10:35 am. The team settles in for a long day, their hectic morning almost over. Sean, Jack, Amelia, and Lisa work on the "Save the Rover" mission.

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Jack and Sean play with the "Lassie" landing portion of their presentation. The halls are getting crowded. A team from Hale School interrupts.

11:35 am. Amelia and Tarek set up for run #2 at the competition tables. The team is no longer in first place.

Laurie, Lisa, Sean, Jack and (behind Jack) Michael relax before the run starts.

11:36 am. The round starts and this time the robot collects the ice cores, but the referee claims they don't count because the arm is too high??? After a bit of discussion, the head ref resolves the dispute.

The gate is dropped, the dust cleared. Now, Amelia tries to get the ball to drop into the MAV Launcher. In the furor, they've inverted the position of the arm that holds the red ball. It fails repeatedly. They leave the table disappointed, but laughing about it.

12:30 pm. The extended lunch continues. Tarek, Lisa, Jack and Amelia discuss important topics like "Linkin Park."

Michael decides to change the batteries after testing the voltage and getting a reading of less than 8.4 volts.

Michael and Tarek refuse to listen to the sage advice of their coaches.

Michael says, "What's firmware?"

Michael maintains his vigil over the downloading firmware. The count goes from 0 to 2450. It takes more than five minutes.

After twenty minutes of trying to download firmware, they give up. The team substitutes another RCX with preloaded firmware. They load all five program slots with the latest programs. Less than five minutes until their third and final round at the competition tables.

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1:55 pm. The roar of the competition area contrasts with the calm demeanor of Michael and Tarek. Michael runs the ice core mission while Tarek snaps the housing modules together for the fourth mission. Note that one ice core is left in the crater. Oh well! (0.8 Mb)

Michael and Tarek struggle to load the housing modules onto the robot's arm using rubber bands. Note that the MAV Launcher has been released (a systems test), but the red ball is still in the launcher. Whoops! The good news: the robot lowered the gate and cleared the dust.

The robot has dropped the housing modules, but the magnets haven't locked. They send the robot back out to retrieve the housing modules.

They reload the housing modules and send the robot out a third time. It drops into place perfectly, but the magnets face the wrong way. Yikes!!! They switch to the "Into the crater" mode, foregoing the "Save the Rover" mission. Quick decision-making.

2:00 pm. Sean and Lisa watch for the robot to cross the line into the base after completing the "Sweep the Solar Panel" mission. This fourth run goes smoothly. For judging the team standings, the first score of the day (290) is their best. They get a 4th of 35 seeding for the upcoming Head to Head competition.

4:53 pm. They are in the last group to run their first head-to-head round. 34 Division 1 and 15 Division 2 teams have already been eliminated, when SAMS runs. Lisa and Michael run the robot.

Lisa and Michael run a great round. They break the 300 barrier.

5:11 pm. Round 2. Amelia and Michael. Everything works until the very last mission, "Rescue the Rover". The rover is off the sand dune, but the robot gets stuck and doesn't get into the crater. With twenty seconds left, Michael throws himself onto the table to grab the robot. Amelia places the 2x2 angle piece over the touch sensor; Michael switches to program slot #1 and presses the green "run" button. The robot crosses the table and leaps into the crater with just seconds to spare. Score 325, only 8 points short of the team's best possible score. (400 points are possible, but the team doesn't have time, programs, or the means to complete all the missions.)

The teams jumps into the competition area to see if it really happened.

6:44 pm. The long day shows on the team's faces at the awards ceremony. SAMS wins no trophies, places 8th in the judged scoring, and has a thrilling day.