By Harlan Rose
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On Nov. 1 and 2, MHS hosted the 2013 Central Oahu VEX Robotics Tournament, where teams 1973B, 1973C and 1973D from MHS all competed. While none of the teams won the tournament, 1973B and 1973D made it to the elimination rounds and 1973B placed third overall.
“It was one of the most fun tournaments this year, being the last regional tournament in Hawaii,” said 1973B driver Junior Alex Noveloso, “It was different because we’re Mililani and winning this tournament would’ve been great because (we’re here) to represent.”
Before the tournaments, the team builders have to inspect the playing fields and build a robot that will complete the necessary tasks for that field. “It takes a lot of planning and testing, it’s a lot of tedious work,” said 1973C builder Junior Brysen Kumabe, “You know in advance what the field looks like, so you try and build your robot to the specifications of the field.”
Each year, VEX Robotics plays a different game for the tournaments. For the 2013-2014 school year, the VEX game is called “Toss Up.” Each match starts with a 15-second autonomous round, where the robots are not controlled by the team’s driver. 1973C driver Junior Cyrus Noveloso said, “You can start from four different positions, facing any direction you like, so you have to create different (programs) to do different things and you can change it so that it will run different ones depending on where you face it.” The winner of the autonomous round is awarded a ten-point bonus. Alex Noveloso said, “The autonomous bonus is quite possibly the most important in the VEX events because (it’s) pretty much 20 to 25 percent of your whole score.”
Being a driver for the robots can be a difficult task, and it requires careful concentration. “The driver’s main responsibility is to be able to carry out any of the tasks that the coach tells you to do because the driver can’t be focusing on the whole map or what’s going on,” said Alex Noveloso. Cyrus Noveloso added, “The whole tournament’s resting on you, so whether you win or lose is going to all fall on you, so it’s fairly stressful.”
Moving on from the loss, the teams will continue striving to improve their robots for future competitions. “Our robots were kind of heavy and they weren’t the fastest so I think we can probably try and lighten the robots and maybe gear them for speed,” said Kumabe. Cyrus Noveloso added, “(We need) to practice a lot more because one thing we did not do was run practice matches between ourselves, which I think would’ve helped a lot.”
Team 1973B, which placed third overall, will be advancing to the state competition held on Dec. 21 and 22 at Honolulu Community College.
