I’ll start. At the start of the season, my team planned out what we would do each month throughout the season. Then each month, we went more specific by planning each week, then each meeting.
We would use calendars and have deadlines on when we wanted each mechanism (drivetrain, launcher) or code (autonomous, programming skills) done.
So our team has 3hours practices every Friday. but we assign things from each teammate to complete through the week through our discord and coordinate often. we will also have like 9+hour robot marathons on some weekends and schools breaks. (we are an independent team so we cant really meet right after school)
I would recommend making sure you have at least 2 weeks (preferably more) before the competition to grind driver practice.
I learned the hard way that practice is crucial, especially at your first event when you are still getting used to the game. Practice is way more effective though if you can simulate a real match. Even just having one other robot (or drivetrain) playing solid defense on you will prepare you well for your first comp.
As for what my team’s schedule for the season is, it usually goes something like this (we keep it very flexible):
Game release to whenever we finish our first design is building. Then we drive it around with super simple code to see if it works. It doesn’t work, so we rebuild (this step if often repeated a few times). When we have a good working robot, we actually put some effort into programming and auton for a few meetings. Then we grind practicing driving until the competition. We’ll use whoever we can get: other teams in our org (if they’re done), the nearby VEX U team, build another drivetrain solely for defense and rollers, etc.
Once you are a master a driving, and have a good robot, you are ready for your first comp.
I’ll end this with a robotics quote:
“A bad robot with a good driver will always beat a good robot with a bad driver.”
I know it’s a rather simple thing, but making sure you have an environment you feel calm in is key. Eliminating distractions helps us to focus, and I’m sure the same goes for other people. Try to get rid of all the distractions you can, and tune out everything you can’t. It really helps you to stay focused on the task at hand.
we have three teams, two junior leader teams and one senior team, our senior team has the most experience and they have set an outline for progression and goals/deadlines for projects. We have set a timeline for the design process, approval and build schedules and order of attack for projects.
