Hanna next introduced us to The Holy Cows, a team name derived from the sheer number of ideas on a whiteboard during a brainstorm session. THC’s robot was getting ready to roll onto the playing field when Spark visited their pits. There we met team members Kaithlyn (17), Carmel (17), Torstein (17), Cameron (15), and Danielle (16).

One very cool element of THC is that they brought their own mobile machine shop with lathe, press, drills, saws and volunteer operators not just for themselves, but for all the teams. Torstein explained that any team could come up to the truck, explain or draw a pic of what was needed and the machinists would go to work creating or mending a part for the competitors’ bots. At the event THC ended up winning the Regional Chairman's Award.

The last team we met—SuperNURDs (Never Underestimate Robotic Domination)—definitely took the prize for best dressed team, with Superman-inspired T-shirts. In their pit area, we met Aubrey (18) from the team’s business group and Kayla (15), the mechanical lead, who pretty much summed up the feeling at the event: “Being a geek is cool!”

Aubrey, sounding like a true business professional and promoter, felt that her team’s robot had a very good chance to perform well because “Our robot is the most well-rounded,” she said. “It can shoot, climb and defend whereas the others usually do just one of those things.”