The Rush to ‘Bagless’ Day

Andrew Saunders

Each year in the past, every FIRST robotics team had a deadline to finish their robot which was known as “Bag Day.” On that day, all teams were required to have their robot sealed inside a bag at noon on Tuesday after six weeks of the build season. Teams were only given six hours between Bag Day their first competition to make adjustments to their robot.

This year, FIRST decided to scrap Bag Day because it was known that larger teams were already building identical practice robots, which allowed them to run tests and make notes for adjustments to make to the actual robot in the few hours allowed to work on it. 

Bag day may be gone, but the Foley Freeze’s expectations will not change. The team used the same Tuesday that Bag Day would have been on as a deadline to make significant strides for the completion of our robot. Even though there is no mandatory deadline enforced, the team didn’t want to relax because they know how much hard work it takes to make a successful robot.

“‘Bagless Day’ presents a new challenge to every team to stay on task while not having an official deadline enforced by FIRST,” said assistant coach Kevin Swift. “Our priority has been to make sure we don’t slack off as a result of the change.”

The rush to “Bagless Day” motivated us to be on schedule for a competitive robot and we have two more weeks to make adjustments for our first competition at Macomb Community College.