2018 Dallas Regional

From March 1st to 4th, Texas Torque traveled to Dallas to compete at the annual Dallas Regional. After a long bus ride from our home in The Woodlands, the team rested up to prepare for practice day on Friday. We also made final changes to the robot and practiced before the competition, which took place on Saturday and Sunday.

With our robot’s autonomous mode working smoothly as programmed, we were able to place a cube on the scale for our alliance, creating a early boost in score. Some issues with the arm came along during the regional, but we were able to fix them after each match. Though we played some hard matches, we were able to quickly cycle cubes to the exchange station and deliver nine cubes in under a minute. This rapid exchange made us one of the most efficient cycling robots at the event.

We were then invited to join team 5889 on the seventh-seeded alliance, after which we selected team 6655 to complete our alliance. The quarterfinal matches were against one of the top contenders, and the results were hard fought lost on both matches to knock us out.

Texas Torque won the Entrepreneurship Award. We congratulate team 148 and their partners teams 118 and 2789 for winning the regional! We’d also like to commend team 1296 on their Regional Chairman’s Award win.

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The Remix 2017

On the weekend of November 11, teams from all over Texas and as far as Mexico gathered at College Park High School to compete in Texas Torque’s annual offseason competition, the Remix.

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Students, alumni, and other volunteers worked all Friday afternoon to transform the CPHS gym into a FIRST Steamworks game field. On Saturday 32 teams, including four pre-rookie teams, competed to become the Remix champions. CISD superintendent Dr. Stockton visited the event and toured our new robotics lab. During the Remix, there were also workshops about topics like the Chairman’s Award. Texas Torque also sponsored a bedding drive at the Remix to benefit the Angel Reach foundation.

At the end of the day, the 1st seed alliance, led by 148 Robowranglers and joined by 1477 Texas Torque and 5908 Spartans, won the competition. We would like to congratulate the finalist alliance (teams 624, 3478, and 5414), as well as thank our alliance partners for a great run! Overall, the Remix 2017 was a great success, and we would especially like to thank all of the teams, volunteers, students, mentors, and parents that made it happen!

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Lone Star North Regional

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Texas Torque was honored to host the Week 5 Lone Star North Regional at College Park High School this past weekend. We had 33 teams from Florida to Mexico to Turkey compete to become the winning alliance. Texas Torque spent the practice day making mechanical changes to our robot, adding on a new floor gear intake. During the qualification matches, Texas Torque played very well, ending with a 9-2 win/loss record and a 1.90 ranking score, placing us 2nd.

During alliance selections, we allied with 2992 S.S. Prometheus, 4295 Hudson Robotics, and later, 6363 Ricebird Robotics. We had a great run, but lost in Semifinals to a great 3rd seeded alliance (who went on to win the regional!). We would like to congratulate 3284 Camdenton 4H LASER, 5842 Royal Robotics, and 6547 Flaming Metal Robotics on their regional win! Serious props to our mentee team Flaming Metal Robotics – they won their first and only regional of their rookie year!

Quality Award

During the awards ceremony, Texas Torque took home the Quality Award, and our own Ithza Lopez was chosen as a Dean’s List Finalist! Also, a HUGE congratulations to our friends 2881 Lady Cans for winning their first Chairman’s Award!!!

We would also like to give a huge thanks to the student, parent and mentor volunteers that helped our first ever regional run so smoothly! We’re looking forward to hosting more in our new lab these coming years.

Lone Star Central Regional

Texas Torque participated in the Week 3 Lone Star Central Regional this past weekend, and suffice it to say that this regional was one for the books. Along with 40 other teams, Texas Torque competed at Strake Jesuit College Prep for the chance to take home the regional win.

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After a great round of practice matches, Texas Torque emerged from the qualification rounds with a 9-1 win-lose record and the first 4-rotor match of the regional and state. We finished ranked 2nd after team 118, the Robonauts. At alliance selection, the Torqueonauts were revived after six years when Texas Torque was the first pick of 118’s 1st seed alliance. Joining our alliance as the 3rd bot was team 5526 tCATs from Torreon, Coahuila, Mexico.

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With the help of our talented alliance partners, we were able to get multiple 100+ point autonomous periods and 300+ final match scores. We faced some fierce competition throughout the elimination rounds, but at the end of the day we were able to win the regional! This was the first time since 2013 that Texas Torque has won a regional, so needless to say the team was ecstatic!

More good news came during the awards ceremony, when Texas Torque was also selected as the Chairman’s Award winners! This is our 3rd Chairman’s Award in four years, and the start of a now two-year streak of winning Chairman’s. This was also the first time in Texas Torque history that we came home from a competition with 2 blue banners! You can watch our 2017 Chairman’s Video here.

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We would like to thank our alliance partners 118 Robonauts and 5526 tCATs and congratulate the finalist alliance of 3847 Spectrum, 5829 AwtyBots and 3997 Screaming Chickens, who all qualified to attend the World Championship! We would also like to congratulate 5526 tCATs on winning the Engineering Inspiration Award!

We look forward to hosting (and competing in) the Lone Star North Regional at College Park High School in Week 5!

Hub City Regional

At our week 1 regional, the Hub City regional,  Texas Torque competed with 45 other teams coming from across the USA and beyond, including Turkey, and Mexico. Members of Texas Torque were excited to attend a week 1 regional of FIRST Steamworks.

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After scouting a series of matches and intense game plays, we were able to get the highest score in qualification matches and a 10-1 win-lose record. We were the the 2nd seed alliance captain, and picked 3847 Spectrum and 159 Alpine Robotics.

Elimination matches were tough, but we made it to the finals with our great alliance members! The regional was a great start to our season, since we also won the Entrepreneurship Award! With the new implementation of one free wildcard per regional, we were able to qualify for the FIRST World Championship held in downtown Houston!!

Thanks again to our awesome alliance partners, 3847 Spectrum and 159 Alpine Robotics! Congratulations to the winners, 1817 RoboRaiders, 935 RaileRobotics, and 4063 TriKzR4Kidz! Also, congratulations to team 3847 Spectrum for winning Engineering Inspiration, and team 624 CRyptonite for winning Chairman’s Award!

We are extremely grateful to compete in Hub City Regional with great teams, and we look forward to meeting more in our next regional!!

The Remix 2016

On the weekend of October 22, teams from all over Texas and as far as Mexico gathered at College Park High School to compete in Texas Torque’s annual offseason competition, the Remix.

Students, alumni and various other volunteers worked all Friday afternoon to transform CPHS’s gymnasium into a FIRST Stronghold game field. On Saturday 25 teams, both veteran and rookie, competed to become the Remix champions. Dr. Stockton, the superintendent of CISD, came as a guest speaker and gave a talk about the importance of STEM in schools. During the Remix, there were also workshops about topics like Emceeing and Chairman’s Award. Texas Torque also sponsored a bedding drive at the Remix, and the bedding collected from that will be donated to Angel Reach.

At the end of the day, the 2nd seed alliance consisting of 3847 Spectrum, 624 CRyptonite and 4205 Robo Vikes got to go home with the Champion title (and replica swords). We would like to congratulate the winning alliance, as well as thank our alliance partners 231 High Voltage and 3335 Cy-Borgs! Overall, the Remix 2016 was a great success, and we would especially like to thank all of the team, volunteers, students, mentors and parents that made it happen!