2018 Preiļi Robotics Championship held
On 27 January 2018 the second Preiļi Robotics Championship (PRC) was held at Jānis Eglītis Preiļi State Gymnasium (JEPVĢ). The aim of the competition is to popularise robotics in Latgale and the importance of the exact sciences!
The morning of the competition surprised everyone with a rather thick blanket of snow, which slightly delayed the participants’ arrival! This year 332 robots were registered for the competition, while 297 robots/teams from 45 institutions/organisations/clubs came and fought for the podiums, which makes the PRC one of the best-attended robotics competitions so far!
Participants came from various parts of Latvia – Aizkraukle, Rēzekne, Daugavpils, Galēni, Iecava, Ilūkste, Jaunstružāni, Preiļi, Jēkabpils, Kaunata, Krāslava, Limbaži, Ludza, Malta, Mārupe, Nautrēni, Ogre, Riga, Sigulda, Vaiņode, Valmiera, Ventspils, Viļāni, and, as last year, 1/5 of the participants’ robots were from Lithuania! Given the considerable number of robots and participants, the organisers had to think carefully about the competition programme and plan.
At the start of the competition the participants were welcomed by the JEPVĢ director Ligita Pauniņa, the chair of Preiļi Municipality Council Maruta Plivda and a member of the 12th Saeima, Aldis Adamovičs.
The participants built their robots using either LEGO parts or electronic parts. Requirements were set for the construction of the robots regarding size and weight, and other construction restrictions and rules were also defined, as described in the rules.
This year the competition took place in the Mini sumo, Lego sumo, iRobot sumo, Lego line following, free-structure line following, Lego Folkrace, free-structure Folkrace, Freestyle and VEX events. In the VEX event the participants could come without their own robots and without prior preparation – the robots were provided by the organisers. In some events the participants were divided into age groups – pupils or amateurs.
Places on 11 podiums were won during the competition! The winners of 1st–3rd places received valuable prizes, provided thanks to the competition’s supporters: Argus, Arka Preiļi, Celmeņi ask, Datoru drošības tehnoloģijas, iRobot, Just Production, Kursors.lv, Lemona, Letera, LMT, Mikrotik, Preiļu celtnieks, Robotiem.lv, Salang-P, SEB, International School of Innovation, Tomega.
This year there were several special prizes in some events for the schools of the 1st-place winners – in the iRobot sumo event – an iRobot Roomba (a prize from iRobot), in the Folkrace event – a Lenovo Yoga tablet (a prize from LMT), in the VEX event – a VEX IQ Super Kit (a prize from Tomega), in the Lego sumo event – a Makeblock mBot (a prize from Lemona).
THANK YOU to the many pupils of Jānis Eglītis Preiļi State Gymnasium for their volunteer work, and to the technical staff and teachers who took part in organising the competition!
And several special THANKS:
- to the chief referees of the competition Māris Bečs and Armands Upenieks for running the competition fairly, and to Māris also for providing the MegaSumo ring.
- to the chief referees of the competition events: line following – Linards Šmeiksts, Folkrace – Kārlis Berkolds, sumo – Gundars Miezītis, freestyle – Armands Upenieks, iRobot sumo – Einārs Deksnis.
- Kristaps Skutelis, better known as @krizdabz, for excellent hosting and commentary of the event! Kristaps is a passionate expert on new technologies, whose possibilities Kursors.lv (@kursorslv), radio, TV and the press introduce.
- the sound and video streaming team Justs Ribinickis, Aivis Sudniks and Matīss Dambītis, who provided video streaming throughout the whole day, editing and broadcasting the most interesting moments of the competition.
- Kristiāna Skutele and Ginta Meikulāne for capturing moments of the competition in photographs!
- SIA Arka Preiļi for the tasty biscuits and the canteen cooks for lunch for the competition participants!
Members of the Preiļi Robotics Club managed to achieve good results in several events. Matīss Buks won several places – 1st place in the Mini sumo event in the pupils’ group, 1st place and 3rd place in the free-structure robot Folkrace event. Lauris Šmeiksts won 3rd place in the Mini sumo competition in the pupils’ group. Eduards Lipiniks finished 4th overall in the free-structure Line following event in the pupils’ group, but that was the best result among the Latvian participants.
Information about the competition, results.
KRISTAPS’S VLOG #3 – Preiļi Robotics Championship 2018
LRT video report on the PRC 2018 competition
On behalf of the organisers of the Preiļi Robotics Championship, Juris Erts