contributed photo
Sartell High School Robotics Team 6045 shows off its winning robot and prizes March 4 following the Duluth Double DECCer tournament. They are (left to right) Nolan Meling, Henry Patterson, Isaac Patton, Zach Apslund (mentor), Josh Bruemmer, Bryce Larson, Seth Westrup, Matt Cadden, Gabriel Haberman, Tyler Clauson, Burg McSorley, Paige Erickson, Tayt Ackerman, Emmerson Hewett, Evan Huse, Ryan Swanson (coach), Graham Huse, Adam Bertsch, Nick Apslund (mentor), Owen Lukken and Rowan Jurgens.
by Dennis Dalman
The Sartell Sabres robotics team will travel to Houston, Texas toward the end of April to compete in the Robotics World Championship Tournament.
In Duluth on the first weekend of March, the 20 members of Sabre Robotics Team 6045 competed in the Lake Superior Regional First Robotics Tournament. It won first place out of 60 teams. It also won the Sustainability Award for ensuring the safekeeping of its program and an individual dean’s list award for Paige Erickson, honoring her hard work and dedication.
As of March 11, the Sartell team had the second-most wins of any robotics teams in the world and the most wins of any regional worldwide teams.
Their remarkable “winner” is a nifty robot they dubbed “The Bismark” (as in donut).
The world championship tournament will take place
The Sartell Sabres robotics team will travel to Houston, Texas toward the end of April to compete in the Robotics World Championship Tournament.
In Duluth on the first weekend of March, the 20 members of Sabre Robotics Team 6045 competed in the Lake Superior Regional First Robotics Tournament. It won first place out of 60 teams. It also won the Sustainability Award for ensuring the safekeeping of its program and an individual dean’s list award for Paige Erickson, honoring her hard work and dedication.
As of March 11, the Sartell team had the second-most wins of any robotics teams in the world and the most wins of any regional worldwide teams.
Their remarkable “winner” is a nifty robot they dubbed “The Bismark” (as in donut).
The world championship tournament will take place in Houston from April 19-22. The team’s trip will total about $25,000 in expenses (travel, hotel, food and more) and to raise that amount a GoFundMe page has been established on the team’s website. The GoFundMe page can also be found by searching Sabre Robotics from the GoFundMe website.
After its triumph in Duluth, the team made the following Facebook post: “WE WON IT ALL AND ARE GOING TO WORLD’S (Houston, Texas). We couldn’t do this without the help of parents, sponsors, our (team) members and everyone in between! Thank you so much!”
As if the Duluth achievement weren’t enough, Sabre Robotics Team 6045 then went on to come within a hair’s breadth of winning the Grand Forks, N.D. Robotics Tournament on March 11. After winning all the play-off competitions, the team entered the finals where two major disappointments occurred. During Match I, a wire of the robot came unplugged so its arm would not work. Then, in Match 2 its aluminum coupler was sheared off. As a result, the championship was won by Greenbush Middle River team from northern Minnesota. The team lost by three points and would have won the championship almost certainly if the robot’s unexpected problems hadn’t happened.
At Grand Forks, the Sartell team also won the Autonomous Award for their robot’s “razor-sharp precision,” in the judges’ words. On March 10, the robotics team from Sauk Rapids left the tournament early due to concerns about traveling from North Dakota during heavy snow. Sauk Rapids asked the Sartell team to play in their place and the tournament organizers allowed this.
The coach of Sartell Team 6045 is Ryan Swanson. He is a mechanical engineer for COR Massman Automation in Villard and also runs his own company, the Sartell-based COR Robotics. In addition, he leads educational summer camps for students in third through eighth grade, with 240 camps scheduled for next summer.
Swanson, naturally, was thrilled about the team’s win in Duluth and its near-win in Grand Forks.
“Dedication made the team successful,” he said. “It’s the best group of kids I could have imagined working with. They made my job as easy as it could be. I just pointed them in a direction and watched them grow.”
When Swanson was a student in Becker High School, he was on its 2013 robotics team, which made it to the world championship tournament. He has been to 10 world tournaments with the Becker team.
“I’m super fortunate to be in this position and super fortunate for the Sartell kids to have this opportunity,” Swanson said. “I feel good about our chances of doing well at the world championship.”
Members of Sartell High School Robotics team 6045 react to winning a match March 3 at the Duluth Double DECCeR tournament. They are (left to right) Tyler Clauson; Seth Westrup and Josh Bruemmer.
Sartell High School Robotics members prepare their robot to compete on the Duluth Double DECCeR field March 3. They are (left to right) Seth Westrup; Isaac Patton and Tyler Clauson.
