Team42

From VEX Wiki

We are affiliated with the Prince William County, Virginia, 4H program and draw students from a variety of schools. Virginia Polytechic Institute and State University is the state's land grant University responsible for the Virginia 4H programs.

We began as a group of young middle school students meeting at a local hobby shop for the 2006-2007 FIRST Vex Challenge season. We currently seek students who are entering 8th grade or are older.

That first year we were in the hunt in the Virginia State Hangin'-A-Round Championship and were drafted into the Elimination Rounds, but we got knocked out during the semi's.

Using the students' brains, mentors advice and Vex parts we have earned

• A Virginia State FTC Quad Quandary Championship that took us to the FIRST FTC World Championship in the 2007-2008 season
  • Second draft pick of Team Apollo.
• A Dunbar Lab Rats (in Baltimore) VRC Regional Championship in the 2008-2009 Elevation season; but sadly we weren't able to go to Dallas or Omaha.
  • I think we were ranked #2 and were drafted by the Super Sonic Sparks - They and we were undefeated that entire day.
• A NW Maryland VRC Regional Championship in the 2009-2010 Clean Sweep season.
  • After Quals, the top 5 teams were all 5-1-0; we were 4th among them.
  • Alliance Captain #3, Event Horizon, Team 960A drafted us and Acme Robotics 12A (ranked 23rd with a 1-5-0 record)

This 2009-2010 Clean Sweep season we are looking forward to:

• The NW Maryland VRC Regional, Oct 31st, 2009 (See above).
• Our own NOVA VRC Regional in Manassas VA, Jan 23rd, 2010
  • NOVA VRC Registration
• The local school system's middle school VRC scrimmage and tournament.
• The College of Southern Maryland's VRC Regional
• At least one Baltimore or Washington DC VRC Regional

I am Blake Ross; and I am the team's coach/mentor. I can be reached by a private message to "gblake" on the Vex discussion forum web site, a private message to "gblake" on the Chief Delphi discussion forum site, or by sending an ordinary email message to my "blake" account in the "verizon.net" domain.

My advice to Rookies: Step 1 is to build something simple that moves well, and that can score using a simple, straightforward method. Step 2 is to refine the result of Step 1. Until you can move, you can't compete. Until you can score, you can't win. After you can do both, you are ready to enter a tournament; and then you can work on doing both better.

See you on the field,

Blake