Bloomington robotics team I.C.E. Robotics advances to world championship after state title

Written from press release

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — Bloomington-based FIRST Tech Challenge Team 11329, I.C.E. Robotics, will advance to the FIRST World Championship in Houston after captaining the winning alliance at the Indiana FIRST Tech Challenge State Championship on March 14.

The state tournament was held at Nicoson Hall on the University of Indianapolis campus, according to a news release from the team. The world championship is scheduled for April 28 through May 2 in Houston, Texas.

I.C.E. Robotics said its robot, Hailstorm, helped the team finish the regular season with a 31-1 record. The team said its highest score to date came during the state championship, where it posted 396 non-penalized points. According to the release, that score ranks as the third-highest in the United States and 13th globally, while the team’s offensive statistical ranking is now third in the world.

“It’s great that the time we put into this robot has paid off,” Allen Brown, a senior, lead programmer and primary driver, said in the release.

Edward Choi, a junior, lead designer and secondary driver, was also selected as a winner of the FIRST Leadership Award.

“Today I feel like the richest man in the world,” Choi said in the release. “Thank you to all of the mentors who push me to not only be a better engineer, but the best version of myself as a person.”

FIRST Robotics is a global competitive robotics program for students in grades 2 through 12. I.C.E. Robotics competes in the FIRST Tech Challenge, which serves students in grades 7 through 12.

The team is supported by RoboBoosters, a local nonprofit that also supports several FIRST Lego League teams for younger students and FIRST Robotics Competition Team 3494, The Quadrangles.

I.C.E. Robotics is a community-based team that meets in the IU Multi-Disciplinary Engineering Sciences Hall. The group said it accepts students in grades 7 through 12 from Bloomington and surrounding communities.

Local sponsors this year include the IU Luddy School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering, the Indiana Department of Education, the Raymond Foundation, Hans-Otto Meyer, NSWC Crane and IU Credit Union.

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