On December 8, Yeshivat Frisch’s robotics team, the CouGears, competed in FIRST Tech Challenge, an international robotics competition which also happened to be the team’s first qualifying tournament of the year. After spending over three months working on their robot, the CouGears were excited to be able to compete.

At the end of the qualifying matches, the CouGears were selected for a semi-final alliance by a team from Dwight Englewood. They won the semi-final matches and moved on to the finals.

“It was crucial to the team spirit,” said mechanical lead Orli Epstein about the team’s win. “Doing as well as we did gave us a boost that we didn’t know we needed.”

Omer Benharush, who was one of the drivers during the competition, said that it was “gratifying” to see their efforts come to fruition. “We worked long and hard for this, and it’s great that we were able to perform as well as we did,” he said.

The team is now hard at work incorporating new changes and looking forward to the next competition in January!