Robotics team wins district championship
by Lenora Danby
On the weekend of March 20-22, the Cybergnomes Robotics Team 2013 travelled to North Bay for their first district event of 2026 and came home as champions. The high school aged students compete in the First Robotics Competition. There are 119 teams registered in Ontario.
Each team competes in two district events accumulating points to pursue qualification for Ontario Provincial Championships held April 16-19 in Niagara Falls. Worldwide there are over 3,600 teams that compete in regional and district events for a chance to compete in the World Championship held in Houston, Texas.
Each year a new gamT:1e0″ is released in January, and teams must build a robot to complete certain tasks. This year’s game called Rebuilt, involves scoring using foam balls just under six inches called fuel into a six-foot hub. There are 540 balls on the field at the beginning of the game, and they can be used continuously as they pass through the hub to be picked up and used to score again. It is a very exciting game to watch.
Earlier in March the team travelled to Vancouver to compete in a regional event competing against teams from Canada, China, the U.S., Taiwan and Vietnam. Competing with 24 other teams at the North Bay Competition, winning is no small feat. At the tournament, the team faced many challenges, including having the infeed arm that collects fuel break off, coding being a little faulty, and getting stuck surfing on the fuel. Despite that, back in the repair pits, every member of the team worked hard repairing and improving the robot. After a couple of rough matches, the Cybergnomes thought they were defeated, but all their hard work paid off.
They were chosen by the second place team to form an alliance and after gruelling elimination matches, they beat the first place alliance in two straight matches, winning first place in the tournament and earning the three teams in the alliance a blue banner. It is the first blue banner the team has won since 2016, and the entire team – including mentors and alumni – were ecstatic.
Just because the team came home as winners doesn’t mean the work is done, actually quite the opposite. The Cybergnomes have been preparing for their second event in Welland and are tirelessly working on their bot to get it perfect.
Several new improvements are being made to the robot, for example removing the revolving turret shooter and replacing it with a wider, stationary, and higher-powered shooter. This will maximize the speed and volume in which fuel can be shot into the scoring hubs. In addition to that, their infeed table, which is responsible for moving fuel into the shooters, has been redesigned in a way that fuel will not get stuck or stranded in the middle of the robot.
The Cybergnomes team 2013 are a small team based in New Lowell, but members reside from Collingwood all the way to Angus. The Cybergnomes are also fundraising even more to cover the cost of going to the next round of competitions.
They’d like to thank their top sponsors the Rotary Club of Wasaga Beach and Weld Experts, as they have contributed greatly to the team and have made things like overnight travel possible.
Cybergnomes Robotics Inc. is a not-for-profit organization that organizes and operates robotics programs for students aged 10- 18. Donations and sponsorship for the team is appreciated. For more information, mentors can be contacted at cybergnomesteam2013@gmail. com.
