Qualifying Tournament Updates, Advice from Head Ref Rich & Team Updates

 

Qualifying Tournament Updates

Teams that requested three tournaments can now see their assignments for all three events. Click the link to the left to see the tournament rosters. Only a few tournaments still have space (White Mountain in Show Low, High Country in Flagstaff, and Cactus Wren in Estrella). Please contact Christine if your team still needs to sign up for events!

Payment is due for all qualifying tournaments on November 15. Cost for the season is $225 for two qualifiers and $300 for three qualifiers. Begin creating your purchase orders now. Invoices will be sent next week. Late payments will result in a $50 late fee. Failure to pay season registration fees (qualifiers or championship) will result in teams not being allowed to register for events!

Advice from Head Ref Rich

Cheers and happy Fall to all our teams out there. 

As expected there are a few important updates to the FTC Game and Competition Manual.  Please make sure you have access to the Team Updates, keep reading the Competition Manual and get familiar with the new format.  I am sure you have the link but just in case there is any question on best place to find FTC info for this INTO THE DEEP Season, here is the link (which gives easy access to the Manual and the Team Updates…)

The FTC Q&A is also open and we already have a few good postings.  Of specific note, at Kickoff I said I would pass along news if I saw anything regarding the Human Player Action during Auto Period…  As I expected, since the rules do not prohibit Observation Zone activity during AUTO, human players can operate in accordance with the rules as written in the Competition Manual during the Auto Period. 

Finally, as you develop your strategy for gameplay, remember to fully read the rules and pay close attention to the Orange Box comments that clarify the rules.  And, keep up to date on the changes to the Competition Manual!!!!

Enjoy and we look forward to seeing you in action!

TEAM SUPPORT FROM PITSCO - From Ben Arnold, Pitsco Education

This year, we’re offering team giveaways throughout the month of September including $100 Pitsco.com vouchers and TETRIX® parts packs and spare parts. We made it super easy for teams to sign up – they can simply fill out the form at https://offers.pitsco.com/ftc2024-25.

Additionally, Pitsco awards one $150 grant each month to a competitive team. Teams can apply to be considered through our online application at https://resources.pitsco.com/pitsco-team-grant-app.

Lastly, we have two great resources chock-full of inspiration, tips, and tricks to help teams plan and build their bots:

• 2024 TETRIX® FTC Spare Parts Catalog
• TETRIX® YouTube Channel

Team Avatars By FIRST Tech Challenge Staff, Wednesday, September 18, 2024 1:29 PM New this year, FIRST®  Tech Challenge teams will be able to upload team avatars, which will be used to represent teams in official FIRST®  displays at events. Avatars first appeared in FIRST with their addition to the FIRST® Robotics Competition in 2017, and thanks to a huge effort by some very passionate volunteers, we are now excited to also have them in FIRST Tech Challenge!   FTC SDK 10.1 Release Coming Soon The FIRST Tech Challenge Tech Team is planning to release version 10.1 of the FTC SDK on Friday, September 20, 2024. The 10.0 release previously launched on kickoff. The 10.1 release will contain a few additional programming samples and an improvement for the Self-Inspect feature, but the big feature being introduced in 10.1 is the new Color Processing feature. Color Processing brings simple color sensing and color location (within an image) capabilities to Blocks, OnBotJava, and Android Studio users using a simple webcam without having to directly program OpenCV pipelines – and with VisionPortal integration, visualizing what's happening is easier than ever. Vision programming is now within reach for all teams! Check it out on Friday, which is also when the full documentation for the Color Processing feature will be released on ftc-docs.