Stingers Compete in Heritage Conference Robotics!

On March 10th, students from the Introduction to Robotics Fabrication course competed in the Heritage Conference Battlebots competition at United high school.  This is the second year that Marion Center has had the opportunity to compete at this event. After claiming a victory in the preliminary classroom competition, the team of Brayden Rechinbach, Travis Midok, Trenton Graff,  and Sullivan McGraw had only one week to revise their bot and make it the best they could for the competition.

The BattleBot competition consisted of two events. The first is the double-elimination style bracket where the team competed head to head, earning points for pins and damage to other bots. The winner for that event was Portage. The second event was the King of the Ring event, all of the bots were put into the arena, and the goal was to be the last bot standing. The bot that took the victory was River Valley.

While the boys were away competing they had continuing support from the school. The event was live-streamed from United high school and was broadcasted in many classrooms here at Marion Center. The BattleBots took over every conversation of the halls for the day and brought awareness of the work that students are doing in the STEAM Lab. (To watch again, click here.)

“It was cool to watch all of the teams compete this year, especially after competing last year, I have a little bit of different understanding than some other people might have” Paul Smith told the Stinger News. “Their bot had an interesting concept. ”

Even though they did not leave with a trophy, the students left with a one of a kind experience. They learned more than just engineering, wiring, and fabrication, but also teamwork and perseverance!