The Awesome Potatoes robotics team is returning to the VEX Robotics World Championship in Dallas next week. Great Brook Middle School is one of just two schools in New Hampshire that are sending middle school teams. 

There will be more than 800 teams from about 40 countries competing at the world championship, the largest robotics competition in the world. 

“There’s a new game every year,” explained team member Josie Hodsdon, who acts as a builder and driver on the team as well as running programming. At last year’s world championship, this year’s game was announced on the final day, and since then the team has been working to create a robot that’s programmed and built for the challenge.

Their robot, Sir Quasimodo Crypton Reshawn Potato Bot, or Problem Bot for short, needs to be driven to various terminals, where it will collect plastic disks. Then it drives to a barrier and slides the disks to the other side of the playing field, aiming for the sections that grant the most points. 

There are competitions where teams will have to pair up with a second team and work together, as well as competitions where teams will be working alone against the clock.

The Awesome Potatoes team members said things sometimes break, and they need to be prepared to be innovative during competition. In the past, they’ve had a rubber band snap and once a new playing field was sticky and the robots wouldn’t drive.

“It’s infuriating LEGOs,” joked Gwen Moritz, who codes, helps build and helps with the engineering notebook. 

Fiona McKinney also works on the engineering notebook, which she said is used to document everything the team does. The judges go through and read the notebooks and teams’ notebooks can receive awards.

On Thursday, the team was packing up for the trip and expressed that they were both nervous and excited. Since they’d been to the championship last year, they have an idea of what to expect, but there’s always the possibility they’ll have to make last minute adjustments. The team is bringing tools, extra parts, their robot, potato heads and rubber ducks. 

Elena Spinale, who drives, programs and builds for the team, said if something gets off in the beginning of the match, it can throw off the rest of the match, so they have to be prepared.

Mallory Mason, who builds, drives and works on programming, said, “A lot of us have other commitments, too.” The team members are parts of sports teams, clubs and activities outside of school.

The Awesome Potatoes’ coach, Rick Mellin, started the Great Brook robotics program in 2020 right before the COVID lockdown. The first year, he sent out robot kits and the team met over Zoom. Then other members joined after they started meeting in person.

Mellin said of the current all-girls team, “They are confident, support each other, a nd are more than happy to take on and beat the boys in realms they try to claim as their own.”

]]>