World Festival

April 21st Day 2:

The following day, we woke up extremely late as we were all so tired after the long and stressful journey. We came down to an amazing breakfast. We had heard lots about “American Breakfasts” but we were surprised by the sheer size. An all you can eat buffet was on offer, which included cereals, toast etc… but the showstopper was the help yourself fry up option served with maple syrup! Lunch was not something we needed that day! As we had some spare time in St. Louis before the competition began we explored the city. We found extraordinary landmarks, most notably the huge St Louis gateway arch, and the famous Mississippi river.

April 23rd Day 4:

This was the first official day of the competition and we had to get to the event venue- the Edward Jones Dome- to register the team and also this was the day of the pit set up. After spending a lengthy amount of time organising our pit area we were ready to go out and meet other teams at the competition. Some teams had extremely impressive pits and it was an amazing experience to learn about other countries and the people. In the evening we attended the opening ceremony, with many teams performing a special display for other teams it was an enjoyable and interesting experience.

April 25th Day 6:

This day topped off the previous day in terms of stress levels and was extremely nerve wracking but also very exciting! In the morning we aimed to get to the dome as early as possible to secure a place on the robot practice area, to fine tune our robots. We found out then, that we had been selected to have a call back with the judges, which meant they were intrigued about our concepts and designs and wanted to know more information. In the afternoon we had the real robot competitions. and they went okay but not as well as we hoped. However! Although they didn’t go to plan we managed to fasten a place in the top 40%, meaning we could be considered for a top award. In the evening we had a special treat and we got to go and see the St. Louis cardinals play baseball in the Busch Stadium, in an exciting game against the Pittsburgh Pirates.

April 27th Day 8:

On our final day, we travelled back to Canterbury. By mid-day, we had left the hotel and were on our way to the St.Louis airport. Once we had arrived, we checked in and after some minor baggage issues and complications we were off to Dallas airport where we would catch our connection flight to Heathrow, UK. Once we had landed in Dallas , we were told that our connection flight to the UK had been delayed by a couple of hours. So to kill the time we decided to eat lunch early. After finishing lunch, we boarded the plane and sat back. After 9 hours had past, we arrived in the UK at Heathrow airport. We got off of the plane and collected our baggage. Once everything had been sorted we were away, and on the road down to Canterbury.

PLAY - When we won!

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April 20th Day 1:

We left early for a long drive to heathrow. Everything ran smoothly through baggage and customs until the final hurdle, where our plane got delayed by 2 hours.This had a bad effect on the rest of the journey as everything ran out of sync, for example we missed our first connection flight.Our journey became hectic form there and we arrived in America at 2 in the morning local time! This meant that are journey had taken over 24 hours! After a quick check in we arrived in our rooms and collapsed on our beds.

April 22nd Day 3:

This was our rest day, we went looking around the town for shops and also things like restaurants where we could eat the following days to come. At the end of this day we decided to run through all our presentations and really check them to make sure we eliminated any mistakes.We also made sure to have an early night so that we could perform well the following day.

April 24th Day 5:

This was the day when things really started to fall into place and the pressure was starting to be put on. The first part of the day revolved around the 2 mock robot game rounds we competed in. Although the rounds didn’t count score wise, they were useful for handling with the pressure and also making sure the robots were up to scratch. However, we discovered some minor with our robots in these rounds, and we made a team decision to bring them back to the hotel that night and give them some more final key adjustments. The final and most important part of the day came when we had to give all three of our presentations to the judges, Robot, Project and Core Values. It was a tense couple of hours waiting outside rooms, nervously going over our lines. Although, when we finished them all we felt that they had gone to plan and we had delivered a strong impression on the judges.

April 26th Day 7:

This day was certainly the most amazing day of any of the teams lives, with two closing ceremonies and a party. First, was the FLL closing ceremony where all the teams received medals and trophies. There were a handful of cups available to win, the most prestigious award being the Champions Award. In a nutshell, it is the number 1 team in the whole of the world. After a long award process, the announcement everyone had been waiting for was to come. Click here for the amazing result where Team#20650 are crowned champions!!