The Newbie at Mindstorm Mayhem
Mindstorm Mayhem was, as the name suggests, mayhem. Chaos, confusion, pandemonium and insanity, but also lots and lots of fun. It was teamwork, sportsmanship, brainpower, and Legos all rolled into one crazy day.
As a freshman with no experience in robotics whatsoever, the prospect of putting on an event for almost 900 people was, simply put, frightening. For starters, all I knew about the competition was that it was a qualifier for the State LEGO tournament and that our team of 50 students and mentors was responsible for making it all go smoothly. I was assigned the task of scorekeeper, but never having seen a LEGO competition before, I knew virtually nothing about the job.
As we set up at the middle school the night before, I slowly began gathering information so I could have some clue as to what was going to happen. The 48 LEGO teams would compete 4 at a time for 60 rounds, then they would compete to narrow down to the 14 teams who would continue on to the state tournament. My job would be to take the referee’s scorecards and enter the information into a computer. It sounded easy enough…
The next morning dawned bright and early, and I showed up still slightly asleep. I woke up pretty quickly, however, as I helped the team do final setup and people started arriving.
Teams showed up sporting T-shirts decorated with team names and mascots, carrying boxes of precious cargo: their robots. Soon, the Middle School cafeteria was full of teams preparing for the competition. All it took was one look around the room to see that everyone was excited and pumped up for the challenge.
Meanwhile, the gymnasium was quickly filling up with parents and friends. Their enthusiasm was contagious, and I soon found the butterflies in my stomach replaced with eagerness for the start of the match.
Finally it was time. I took my place behind the scorekeepers’ table and got ready for what was sure to be a very interesting experience. The first teams readied their robots, and the race was off. When the match was over, I had the honor of collecting the score sheets from the referees (my teammates who coached the Shrewsbury LEGO teams) and bringing them back to the table where Kyle, Becca and I quickly entered the information into a program that would calculate each team’s scores. Each round was two-and-a-half minutes long, which gave us 150 seconds to type as quickly as possible (without making a mistake). It was nerve-wracking at first, but I soon got into a pattern. Around the middle of the day, I was actually enjoying myself; it became a little race, me against the clock, to get the sheets done before it was time to collect the next ones.
As the day wore on, the excitement increased. The LEGO teams were doing great, but my teammates and I were also laughing and joking around as we did our respective jobs. Being a newcomer, the general chaos going on was a great way to get to know my team better. Even though we were working, it was still fun because we got to goof around while doing it.
By the end of the day, we were all exhausted. I remember wondering how the teams and fans could still have so much energy left for all the cheering and chanting they were doing. The support continued right up to the very end, and as I entered the data for the last elimination match, I actually felt a bit sad. The whole day, which had once seemed like an unnerving experience, had actually gone by quickly and without a hitch.
After all the rounds had been completed, I stood at the awards ceremony, high-fiving the winners as they came up to receive their accolades, and I felt proud. Proud of the kids who worked so hard to get to the competition, proud of my team who made the entire event possible, and proud of myself for making it through the day. It felt wonderful to stand in the long line of judges and staff (my team), and I knew right then and there that I was going to have a great time in robotics!
Karina Naras