Photo provided by First Indiana Robotics Columbus��� Team 4926, known as GalacTech, prepares to compete at the For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST) State Championship.
Just a few months after competing in an international championship, a local robotics team is back at work and preparing for another competition — not just as a participant, but also as a host.
Team 4926 or “GalacTech” will host the 2022 Indiana Robotics Invitational (IRI) at Columbus East High School on July 16-17. There is no entry fee for spectators, and teams from all over North America have been invited to compete, said Columbus Robotics president and Team 4926 founder Sam Geckler.
The event comes on the heels of a season that was eventful. In April, GalacTech was part of the winning alliance at the For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST) Indiana State Championship. The team then competed at the international FIRST Championship in Houston, making it to division playoffs but not the final tournament. More than 450 high school teams from all over the world competed at the 2022 FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) championships, including groups from as close as Indianapolis and as far away as Israel.
Team 4926 also had its first-ever home game in March, with Columbus East hosting the first FRC event to ever be held in Columbus.
“It’s been a wild year, that’s for sure,” said Geckler.
While the March event was part of the official season for FIRST, the Indiana Robotics Invitational is an off-season event. According to Geckler, the event has been held for more than 20 years. Teams first apply to compete, and then a certain number are invited to the competition.
A couple of FRC teams from Indiana have been the “historical organizers” for IRI, including the Kil-A-Bytes (Team 1024 – Indianapolis), Cyber Blue (Team 234 – Indianapolis) and the TechnoKats (Team 45 – Kokomo). The event was not held in 2020 and 2021.
The invitational has typically been held at Lawrence Township schools. However, both Lawrence North and Lawrence Central High Schools are having some construction work done and are unable to host this year.
“The organizing committee had been down and played at Columbus East this year for the district event that we had here,” said Geckler. “… They liked the venue, and so they asked us if we would host IRI, which was never in our plans. And the organizing committee and Team 4926 as a whole was pretty exhausted after the run to the world championship, but that was an opportunity we really couldn’t turn down.”
Teams will arrive on Friday, July 15, with games held on Saturday and Sunday. Geckler said that, at the moment, they’re unsure as to which teams are coming, but 56 have been invited. This includes teams from all over the United States and some from Canada and Mexico.
However, the teams that are invited do not always choose to attend, due to the costs of travel and shipping robotics equipment.
“In the past, teams have come from Israel and New Zealand to play IRI, but I think, unfortunately, the current economic situation’s just not favorable for travel,” said Geckler.
He noted that the event is a bit “unusual.” The competition will include the usual setup for FIRST events — qualification matches, followed by alliance selections and playoffs — and utilize the organization’s 2022 game, “Rapid React.”
However, IRI is also a charity event. Organizers will pick a charitable organization to receive contributions from the event, including proceeds from a silent auction and a portion of the entry fees paid by teams. There may also be a talent show.
The designated charity is usually connected to current events, said Geckler. In 2019, the event raised funds for Team 4418 or “Impulse” of Highlands Ranch, Colorado, following a school shooting at STEM School Highlands Ranch in May of that year.
“The individual killed during the recent school shooting was one of our own, Kendrick Castillo, a senior on FIRST Robotics Competition Team 4418, STEM IMPULSE from Colorado, USA,” FIRST officials said in a blog post, just days after the tragedy. “He was in his final week of high school and had plans to study engineering in college. Reports have emerged of Kendrick rushing the gunman and likely preventing additional deaths. He is being rightly hailed as a hero.”
The 2019 Indiana Robotics Invitational raised funds to help Team 4418 pay its entry fee for the upcoming FIRST season and contribute to a victim support and memorial fund set up by FIRST.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if we see something going to Texas this year, but I can’t confirm that,” said Geckler.
In discussing the invitational, he said that the timeline to prepare for the event is tight. Team 4926 had a year to plan the March district event, but the invitational comes just a few months after the FIRST Championship.
“We have the biggest crowd now of students that we’ve had since our inception,” he added. “We’re almost overwhelmed. On summer nights, I can get 30 kids in the shop — 30 high school kids trying to build robots. … We’re inundated. We’re trying to recruit new mentors to come and help these kids do the things that they want to do.”
For instance, the students have designed a major modification to their robot — the same one that won the state championship — to increase its capacity, so the team is now building a second robot just for the invitational. He admitted that he’s not sure if they’ll be able to finish it in time.
Still, anticipation is in the air as the invitational nears.
“This is a rare opportunity to see some of the best teams in the world — I know for a fact, because we played with some of them down in Texas,” said Geckler. “There’s going to be some crazy robots showing up here. So we’re excited.”
