This past weekend ACME attended the Napa Qualifier. This was our last qualifying tournament, and since we had already qualified for the Northern California Regionals, this tournament was a practice tournament and we didn’t feel the need to be completely stressed out about matches. 

We practiced judging bright and early and set up our pit area. This tournament we wanted to test out a new pre-scouting technique where we went around to our alliance partners for each match and asked them to draw out their autonomous paths on a field diagram we had printed out. This worked quite well, as it allowed us to run different auto paths based on our partners capabilities and paths. 

Our qualifying matches went very well! We won every one and placed third overall. Since we didn’t need to qualify, we weren’t interested in being alliance captain, so we decided to let the first place team pick us for their alliance. Although we went out in the semi-finals, we had a great time competing. 

Another big accomplishment for this tournament was that every single group of judges came and talked to us. This meant that we made the shortlist for every award where judges come and talk to you. This was a first and we were very proud that our judging presentation made such a good impression on the judges. 

We ended the day by winning the Control award for our software. It was