I can’t remember where Matt was, but for some reason we were in two different places. I found the robotics area and summoned him over because this was very fun.
I’d heard this and that about robotics competitions, but had never seen anything in real life. This wasn’t an actual competition, but I learned how once per year the rules/goals/objectives for the current contest are released and then high school students form teams and design their robots to meet the objectives of the contests.
In this case, they were supposed to have their machines grab balls, carry them and then get them through the gates of the castle. There were things to navigate around. There were also bonus points awarded if the machine could hang from the bar of the castle for a specified amount of time (20 seconds or so).
Setting things up for competition. I didn’t get any good pictures of the obstacles, but the machines had to make their way over teeter-totters and other such things.
The machines seemed to need a good amount of tinkering.
Getting ready for battle. This machine lowered the back half to grab the ball, and then the yellow cords pulled the ball in the the middle of the machine for transport.
The names of the teams were very fun.
An example of one of the robots hanging. We watched a few rounds of competition. Once they got going, it was very fast paced and exciting. 
One of the many different puzzles available to solve.
Perhaps you need your own Dalek?
I worked for a long time to get all 8 blocks in the box and Matt solved it in no time at all.
Apparently when not farming, Glen and Ruth are making puzzles.
Could you tell who built and competed in the robotics competition? High school students? College? Clubs?
These were high school students. Apparently there’s a whole farm-team-style system where they start in elementary school with the basic Lego Robotics sets and work their way up to designing their own stuff. It seems to be a spendy activity. I’m not sure who pays to build each year’s course, but they can’t be cheap. It seems to be very well-funded by computer-type people.
The puzzles look very cool! I’m not as skilled in puzzling as my more logical partner…
Did the participants have to hook their machines up to the bar they hung off of or did the machines have to get themselves hooked up to it?
A lady I knew in high school, her teenaged sons do robotics competitions in Florida (and are apparently quite good). I never thought to ask her more about how they got involved in it, who funds it, etc. Maybe I will next time she posts about it.
The machines hook themselves up! Isn’t that amazing? I was very impressed by the whole thing.