Welcome to the Northern Lights and Lake Superior Regionals.
I know it’s hard to believe but it is the 10th Anniversary for the Lake Superior Regional! Watch for some fun celebration items.
For those of you who are new to this event, two regionals are held in the same building, the Duluth Entertainment Convention Center (https://decc.org/ ). Below is some information to get you started on planning details.
FIRST website event pages:
Lake Superior Regional (https://www.firstinspires.org
Northern Lights Regional (https://www.firstinspires.org
FIRST Minnesota website (https://firstuppermidwest.org
Volunteers Needed
The Volunteer Coordinators need your help to fill in the gaps in the Volunteer Crews in the Duluth (Northern Lights and Lake Superior) events. In particular, they are seeking:
—Northern Lights—
• 5 – robot inspectors
• 1 – field reset
• 1 – Flag Ninja (Fri/Sat only)
• 2 – Pit Admin
• 1 – Team Queuing
• 4 – Safety Attendants; especially Saturday 11:30 AM to 5 PM! Adults welcome so that students can watch the matches
• Field Assembly: Must be on-site by 1 PM on Wednesday afternoon AND be able to lift 75# to properly place the competition truss.
• Field Teardown: immediately following the event on Saturday afternoon
—Lake Superior—
• 1 – Team Queuing
• 1 – Flag Ninja (Fri/Sat slot)
• 2 – Spare Parts
• 4 – Safety Attendants: Saturday Afternoon – adults welcome so the students can watch the matches. 11:30 AM to 5 PM
• Field Assembly: Must be on-site by 1 PM on Wednesday afternoon AND be able to lift 75# to properly place the competition truss.
• Field Teardown: immediately following the event on Saturday afternoon
The FIRST Volunteer Registration page can be found here (https://www.firstinspires.org
Team Lunches
The Duluth competitions are held in the DECC (Duluth Entertainment Convention Center) which has concession vendor contracts that prohibit the public from bringing their own food and drinks to an event. This rule applies to teams and spectators. We have often looked the other way to items being brought in because we understand that a large number of you are traveling and meal costs can be high. However, over the past couple of years the amount of food brought in has greatly increased. Some teams are plugging crockpots in at unsafe locations, trash and recycling are not being disposed of properly, and food items are being left out against health code standards. Because of this, the DECC will be strictly enforcing the “No Outside Food or Beverage” policy this year. Any meals or snacks that you will be providing will need to be consumed in your hotel rooms. Your cooperation in getting this message out to your team and all the spectators is greatly appreciated. Team members are encouraged to bring empty water bottles, as there will be refill stations around the venue.
The team lunch form is posted and the deadline for ordering is Feb 20th. The order form is on this page (https://firstuppermidwest.org
Team Feed and Social
Want to feed your team quickly and cheaply on Thursday or Friday night? Grandma’s Sports Garden is again shutting its doors to the public and letting only FIRST teams in both Thursday and Friday nights. The Team Feed is an Italian buffet on Thursday. The Team Social is serving a Mexican buffet on Friday. Details can be found here (https://firstuppermidwest.org
Adventure Zone discount tickets
As part of our partnership with Grandma’s, they are offering discount tickets to the Adventure Zone game room during the week of the event. Additional details will be coming soon on this page (https://firstuppermidwest.org
Junk Yard Robots
For teams new to the Duluth events, check out the very popular Junk Yard Robots competition. For returning teams, you know the creativity bar is high. As part of the DECC’s recycling efforts, this is a great way to use up some of the scrap materials that are lying around your shop after building this year’s robot. It’s a fun competition with fantastic awards supplied by the DECC judges. Contest rules can be found here (https://firstuppermidwest.org
Team Seminars
If your team would like to host a seminar, please send me a description (MarkBLawrence@gmail.com). Seminars are held on Thursday afternoon and typically 50 minutes in length. I can’t guarantee that all seminars will be held because of time and space limitations.
FIRST Ladies Event
The FIRST Ladies Event, sponsored by Northern Clearing, will be in the Harborside Ballroom on Thursday, March 5th at 10 am – 11:30am. Your co-hosts this year will be SubZero Robotics, FIRST Team 5690, from Esko and Tech-No-Tigers, FIRST Team 3102, from Nevis. Members of FIRST Team 6022, The Wrench Warmers, will be assisting with event promotion and set-up the morning of the event.
There is no sign up for this event.
Load in/out
There will be a different traffic flow for load-in/out. Details will be coming later. When you come to the event, please pay attention to the traffic people and police outside the DECC.
Regards, Mark Lawrence
Chairman, MN FIRST Regional Planning Committee