(April 5, 2012) — Anxious gazes followed numerous cheers from the crowd as the robot shot yet again another basketball into its designated hoop. Team 696, Clark’s very own robotics team, was one of the 66 teams at the robotics competition in Long Beach March 15–17. The 30-member team celebrated as they finally saw the culmination of countless hours of work. “Thursday’s practice showed a promising future for the rest of the competition,” said Hoard. The practice matches helped the team determine what needed to be fixed in time for the competition. Surpassing most expectations of mechanical objects, the robot and turboencabulator worked perfectly fine with the new design the team was testing. (A turboencabulator is an alternative method of providing power using power by the modial interaction of magneto-reluctance and capacitive duractance.) The team was on a winning streak all the way through until they began encountering difficulties. “On Saturday we won a lot of matches until we started having battery problems,” Hoard said. By the end of the competition, the judges were in favor of team 696 and even “liked our perfection,” Hoard said. “One of the judges, Armineh, she actually came up to me and said, ‘Perfection!’” They did, however, place 12th in the quarterfinals that Saturday. The team also received the quality award, which focuses on quality (both in team and robot), appearance, planning and organization. “It was very gratifying to see our hard work earn us a prize,” said sophomore Saikiran Ramanan. “A lot of other teams were also impressed with our robot.” “The judges were most impressed with our documentation and sourcework,” Hoard said of the four-day competition. “I think we did very well and we turned our team around. We’re one of the best teams now.”