Announcement for 2005 Scrimmage

Announcement sent to TigerBots email list for the 2005 Scrimmage.

Los Altos Scrimmage Teams,

We're looking forward to seeing all the Los Altos Robotics teams on Sunday October 16 for the Los Altos Robotics Scrimmages at Covington and Oak Avenue Elementary Schools in Los Altos. Last year we had one Scrimmage and Local Competition at Blach Intermediate School. This year we have more teams so we are going to have the Los Altos Scrimmages and regional qualifying Los Altos Local Competitions at Covington and Oak Avenue Elementary Schools in Los Altos. Team location assignments will be announced after the September 27 Los Altos Robotics Board of Directors meeting. Here are some more details:

Location: The Los Altos Scrimmages will take place in the Multi Purpose rooms at Covington Elementary School which is located at 205 Covington Road, Los Altos, CA 94024 and at Oak Avenue Elementary School which is located at 1501 Oak Avenue, Los Altos, CA 94024. The Multi Purpose rooms face the parking lots at both schools and are easy to locate once you are at the schools. Here are links to Google maps for Covington Elementary School and Oak Avenue Elementary School.

Cost and Payment Details: The cost is $50 per team for both the Los Altos Scrimmage and regional qualifying Los Altos Local Competition. Payment is due by September 24, 2005. Follow the registration and payment details at http://www.losaltosrobotics.org:8080/Main/FLLSignups#TeamLAreg.

No Judging at the Scrimmage: There will not be any judging at the Scrimmage. But just for the fun of it, there will be certificates for things like the most times up at the table, highest score, and most improved. The final set of certificates to be given out will be decided on the day of the Scrimmage. At the Scrimmage, the teams will get to compete with their robots and benefit from the experience of preparing for an event and enjoy a cross pollination of ideas. Remember, we have the Scrimmage for the fun of it and to practice participating in and putting on a competition.

Research Project: Teams that participate in the Research Project part of the challenge will be judged at the November 19 Local Competition and not at the Scrimmage. There is an award for the best research project and it contributes to earning the Directors Award. Participating in the Research Project part of the challenge is optional. Many teams participate in this part of the challenge and learn from it and enjoy it. Some first year teams pass on it because they are learning a huge amount as rookie teams and decide not to devote time to this part of the challenge.

Teams: We have 23 teams for the competitions. See the text below the tables for what to do if you have corrections or do not see your team listed. The FLL numbers, names, and coaches for teams that we know about are:

Los Altos Robotics FLL Tournament Teams
Registered	FLL #	Team Name	Coach(s)	School(s)	# & Grade(s)
Yes	411	LEGO Legends	Gordon Elder/Linda Runke	Oak Avenue & Loyola	4 - 6th
Yes	508	DogBots	Michael Schuh/Dave Lordemann	Blach Intermediate	4 - 7th
Yes	1023	RoboPups	Lew Yobs	Graham Middle (MV) Covington Ponderos (SV)	4 - 6th 1 - 5th
Yes	1189	Firebots	Diane Silverman	Almond	4 - 4th
Yes	1998	Tumbling Titanics	Scott Schearer	Oak	4 - 5th
Yes	2269	Mechanical Monkeys	Edmond Macaluso	Covington & Bullis Charter	3 - 6th 1 - 8th
Yes	2676	Lords of the Legos	Martin Van Ryswyk	Oak	5 - 5th
Yes	2889	20,000 Bricks	Tim Burks	Home School	3 - 5th 3 - 7th
Yes	3171	Y Bots	Spencer James	Almond	4- 4th 2 - 6th
Yes	3493	4Bobcats	Ben Hua	Santa Rita	4 - 4th 1 - 5th
Yes	3407	Defy Gravity	Bill Welden	Blach	3 - 8th
Yes	3522	StormRunners	Daphne Luong	Almond	6 - 4th
Yes	4011	Flying Viking	John Dilley	Egan, Blach, & Cupertino Middle	3 - 7th 1 - 8th
Yes	2955	Lego Population Controllers	Eric Muller/Melissa Lui	Covington and Other	5 - 5th

Please check this list carefully and let me know at Michael@Boardsailor.com if you know of any other Los Altos and Los Altos Hills teams or if your team will not be participating in either or both events. Please register missing teams at http://www.losaltosrobotics.org/XForm/RegisterTeam so we can collect the team information. Send Michael@Boardsailor.com any other corrections to the list. The FLL team number is the number that FLL gave the person who registered the team. The team names can be changed during the season but if we are notified too close to an event, materials may have already been printed with the old name.

Volunteers: We need lots of help for the tournaments. The Scrimmage is an easier event to put on than the Local Competition so it makes a great warm up for the volunteers for the Local Competition. At the Scrimmage, we will ask for volunteers for the Local Competition. Please be ready to help out by volunteering when asked. See http://www.losaltosrobotics.org:8080/Main/FLL/tournament_volunteer.html for position descriptions. All of the jobs allow you to watch most, if not all, of the competition, and some jobs (such as judging) involve interacting directly with the teams, which is a lot of fun. We try to make all of the jobs enjoyable for the volunteers. So please let Tim Burks or Michael Schuh know if you can fill one or more of these positions. Thank you to all that have volunteered to help and those that will help us out at the events.

Food: No food or drinks (except water) inside the multi purpose rooms.

Contacts:

Covington School Events: Tim Burks, Home (650) 948-3034, and Tim@LosAltosRobotics.Org
Oak Avenue School Events: Michael Schuh, Home (650) 965-8037, Work (650) 604-1460, and Michael@LosAltosRobotics.Org

Current Event Schedules:

Sunday October 16 at Oak Avenue and Covington Elementary Schools - Scrimmage: A scrimmage is a fun event where teams get together and run their robots against each other. At a scrimmage, the teams will be able to get an idea as to how well they are doing relative to other teams and benefit from a cross pollination of ideas. Because the Scrimmage happens half way through the season, most teams will only be able to run a few of the missions. They will also be able to continue working on their robots during the event. There will be up to twelve teams participating at each of the two locations. Here is a tentative schedule:

Saturday November 19 at Oak Avenue and Covington Elementary Schools - Local Competition: Each of these locations is where 10 to 12 teams will compete against each other and certificates will be given for the many different categories. Judges will be observing and speaking to each team during the tournament. Descriptions of the judging categories are in the FLL Team Manual and on the FLL website. Some of the participating teams will qualify to participate in the Northern California State competition and the rest of the teams will be finished with competing in the 2005 FLL season. Here is a tentative schedule:

Sunday January 14 at San Jose City College in San Jose - The Northern California FLL State Tournament: 64 teams out of several hundred in the Bay Area will participate in the No. CA FLL State Tournament. The event will run all day. All are welcome to attend as spectators. There is no fee for spectators to attend. Information for the event is at http://www.playingatlearning.org/NCaFLL/2005/index.html. San Jose City College is located at 2100 Moorpark Avenue, San Jose, CA 95128. This tournament is made possible because of the efforts of a small group of very dedicated volunteers headed up by Mark and Jill Edelman. The expenses for this event are only partially funded by the team registration fees and the rest is funded by contributions. Please help Mark and Jill out by contributing to their 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation by following the directions in the "Donating to Support NCaFLL" section near the bottom of the NCaFLL (Northern California FIRST LEGO League) page.

More information will be sent out before the Scrimmages and Local Competitions. It is going to be a great season.

Thank you for participating in FLL,
Michael and Tim