Trout Lake Robotics Team 2020
Donation protected
Iron Mustangs
The Iron Mustangs are a high school FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) team from Trout Lake, Washington. Every January, a challenge is released and our team has until the day of our first competition to design, fabricate, code, and test a robot suitable for the competition. This year the challenge is Infinite Recharge, a challenge designed by FIRST, Disney, and LucasFilms to incorporate a Star Wars theme. We will be attending two qualification competitions in the Pacific Northwest, this year we are competing at Clackamas Academy, Oregon (February 27-29) and West Valley, Spokane (March 4-6). If we place well enough at the regional competitions, we will qualify for the Pacific Northwest Districts Tournament at Eastern Washington University (April 1-4) and the World Championship in Houston, Texas (April 15-18). During the 2019 season this past year, we were successful enough to compete at the Districts Tournament in Tacoma, WA, and the season before we competed in Houston. We also participate in a variety of off-season events including “Bunny Bots” and “Girls Generation.”
All of the money we raise goes directly towards building materials, registration, lodging, and travel.
Our Team
Nia Burtchell-Norman (freshman): I'm Nia, and this is my first year in robotics. I've gone to Trout Lake School my whole life and like to try out every activity we have to offer! I also play soccer, kayak, ski, and a ton of other cool things! You'll be able to spot me anywhere -- just look for the pink Pit Vipers!
Betty Lou Nelson (freshman): I'm a soccer player, kayaker, skier, and as of this year robotics rookie who's known to many as Panda. I have no idea what I want to do with my life but I'm only a freshman so I've got time to dream up some crazy plan. In the meantime, I am ready to have some fun and I am so excited for my first ever year of robotics!
Willa McLaughlin (freshman): Willa stays busy. She loves running around the woods, basketball court, kitchen, track, and now the shop. A writing fanatic and big fan of dance parties and world peace she is very excited for her first robotics season. Although she hasn’t found exactly what she wants to do she is pumped to get to know new people and to learn about programming and the engineering world.
Trevor Collins (freshman): I'm a rookie member with experience in FLL programming and design. I am interested in Lego stop motion. I am also an avid Star Wars Fan and super pumped up for the Rise of Skywalker film.
Owen Tattersall(freshman): This is Owen's first year on the team. He loves "making stuff", playing baseball, and soccer. He may be the shortest member on our team but he makes a huge difference when it comes to fabrication and design.
Sean Rubesh (sophomore): Hi! My name is Sean Rubesh, but I am also known as Spoon, STS (Don't ask), Little White Sean (Yep, I was that kid), SeansterMonster (My personal favorite), and countless other nicknames that I have picked up over the years. Anyways, as for what role I have on the team, I help in designing the robot and putting it together once an idea has been agreed upon, and I am also one of the main drivers at competitions.
Ahmira Elyard-Jaeger (sophomore): Ahmira is our amazing safety captain, she always keeps us on our toes and is always willing to give a helping hand. She is interested in fabrication, media, and strategy. While she is not in the shop, she typically has her nose in a book and is secretly planning world domination.
Devon Bernacki (sophomore): Whenever Devon is not outside mountain biking, trail building or skiing. He is at school, doing morning band, soccer, and robotics. Despite doing all of this, he still has time to come up with ideas for a robot and spend his nights working on building a robot. He does everything from design to driving, and a bit of added dancing during the competitions.
Tyler Collins (junior): Tyler is always spending time at a whiteboard dreaming up airplanes or robots. While we may not stop at Five Guys at competitions, Tyler has not let left us yet although he may either abandon us to watch Star Wars: The Rise of the Skywalker or become our secret weapon with the Star Wars themes challenge this year.
Evan Tattersall (junior): Evan is a returning member who loves to sort bolts and programming, but only programs outside of robotics. When he is at the meetings he just can't resist getting his hands on the robot. He stays busy, running back and forth from robotics to cross country or track.
Clara McMahon (junior): Known as Big Dawg, this queso lovin’, crazy mockup buildin’, wannabe Italian, will often be found munching the snacks and operating the tablesaw. This is her third year on the team and she never fails to keep us laughing.
Eileen Wendell (senior): A do everything, outdoor enthusiast, robotics loving, human, spending the first semester of the year studying abroad in Spain. But no worries, she made sure she’ll be back in time for build season. On the team she tends to spend time doing just about everything possible. Some days hopelessly trying to program, others spent fundraising and writing GoFundMe bios, adding LEDs to the robot, and others helping with strategy or fabrication. In the future she is hoping to save the world through civil or mechanical engineering with a focus in environmental engineering.
Naomi Elyard-Jaeger (senior): Chasing waterfalls in a kayak, pursuing the hippie lifestyle, and wiring up electronics boards keeps Naomi quite content. This year she spent her first semester of senior year traveling across Canada and Costa Rica with World Class Kayaking Academy but is returning for her fourth build season. Her goal after high school is to backpack across South America, kayak in Africa, and sail across the South Pacific, and become a teacher.
Lillie Goodson (senior): Whether she’s running after a soccer ball, running on trails, or running a river in a kayak, Lillie is always on the move. She always keeps the team fed with different baked goodies and loves people, power tools, and the politics of robotics.
Scott VanLaar (senior): The radical broski who never fails to make puns about everything and anything. While Scott may have had some trouble coming up with a bio, he has plenty up his sleeve when it comes to programming, jokes, and spicy food. With the programming bug, Scott is interested in going to college and studying computer science.
Mentors
Brett Logan: Brett is our nuts and bolts EMT, with keys to the hardware store, we always have access to emergency parts. Also known as the snack man we have a steady supply of Cheez Its and cookies. He has been helping this team for years, encouraging students to dance, If you ever have any questions about the rules of the game or how to pack a trailer, Brett is the man.
Sally Wells: “The Cat Came Back”. She just couldn’t stay away. Sally coached Team 3711 for five years before retiring from her teaching career. She keeps returning for the fall season to help with Girls’ Generation competition, fundraising and prepping for our Bunny Bots competition in December. We even convinced her to leave her winter home in Costa Rica to join us in Houston for the World Championship. We’re hoping that she’ll be in Houston with us again.
Rod Nelson: Our fearless leader Rod Nelson (aka Dr. Doom, although we’re looking for a new one) has a M.S. in electrical engineering from WSU, 1972. Rod's career included testing missile guidance systems, monitoring nuclear reactors, controlling windmills and optimizing sawmills. He has never stopped chasing windmills (ie Don Quixote), so now he Coaches our Robotics Team when he is not foraging for mushrooms. His famous mottos are “assume it doesn’t work until you test it” and “If you leave it til the last minute, it only takes a minute”.
Dennis Hill: Dennis has 3 years experience as a FIRST Robotics mentor. He grew up in nearby White Salmon and received his engineering degree in Aeronautics and Astronautics from the University of Washington. Dennis moved to Trout Lake after retiring from a 40 year career at the Boeing Company in Seattle where he held numerous positions in engineering, computing and management. With all this retirement time on his hands, there’s nothing he’d rather be doing than helping high school students build a robot.
Dennis McMahon: Spent 28 years developing software in the mining industry, then switched to digging for bugs in sawmill optimization software. Ex-alpinist, ex-bike racer, and couple other 'ex' things until having kids knocked some sense into him. Embraces both primitive and modern technology (ignores all the stuff in-between). Still not sure what he wants to do when he grows up.
Terry Schmid: In his youth Terry could usually be found driving farming equipment all around Trout Lake Valley and breaking the machinery on rocks. How the tables have turned! Now Terry is the one driving and fixing the tractors that break rocks. Although demolishing rocks is fascinating, Terry spends what seems like an equal amount of time in the shop making sure we don’t build a robot that will fall apart as soon as it connects to a computer.
Steffen Furholm: Software engineer at a startup, but also has an interest in mechanical engineering and electronics. Spends his spare time with the robotics team, in front of a computer, on a bike, designing next years Christmas light show, or when there’s time left over, with his wife and kids. According to Steffen, the correct number of bikes to own is n+1.
Jason Markham: Jason is his name and programming is his game. He is the most positive asset on our team, and our chaperone on coffee runs. After studying electrical engineering and fine arts at UC Santa Cruz, Jason is now one of the Bros at Nelson Bros. In the very few moments he is not typing on a keyboard with a computer in his lap, he is mountain biking or trail running or watching us struggle to debug code on our own.
Trout Lake Valley:
Trout Lake is a small town located at the base of Mt. Adams.(http://mtadams.tv/) Surrounded by forests, rivers, old lava flows, it is truly a beautiful place. (There are also aliens and a friendly Sasquatch, look it up on YouTube). It is a hub for hiking, kayaking, mountain biking, and many other recreational activities. The community is incredibly supportive, the huckleberry smoothies are to die for, and there are more cows than people. Summers are spent jumping into freezing glacier water and designing robots for the local fair.
Trout Lake School:
Trout Lake school is a K-12 school with 300 students in total. Students aren’t only from Trout Lake, some are from neighboring towns, such as BZ, Husum, Glenwood, and White Salmon. The high school has a whopping 76 students who are all involved in just about everything. Sports are a very big deal at TL, but we are very fortunate to have a great group of kids interested in robotics and the support for the program has been awesome.
The Iron Mustangs are a high school FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) team from Trout Lake, Washington. Every January, a challenge is released and our team has until the day of our first competition to design, fabricate, code, and test a robot suitable for the competition. This year the challenge is Infinite Recharge, a challenge designed by FIRST, Disney, and LucasFilms to incorporate a Star Wars theme. We will be attending two qualification competitions in the Pacific Northwest, this year we are competing at Clackamas Academy, Oregon (February 27-29) and West Valley, Spokane (March 4-6). If we place well enough at the regional competitions, we will qualify for the Pacific Northwest Districts Tournament at Eastern Washington University (April 1-4) and the World Championship in Houston, Texas (April 15-18). During the 2019 season this past year, we were successful enough to compete at the Districts Tournament in Tacoma, WA, and the season before we competed in Houston. We also participate in a variety of off-season events including “Bunny Bots” and “Girls Generation.”
All of the money we raise goes directly towards building materials, registration, lodging, and travel.
Our Team
Nia Burtchell-Norman (freshman): I'm Nia, and this is my first year in robotics. I've gone to Trout Lake School my whole life and like to try out every activity we have to offer! I also play soccer, kayak, ski, and a ton of other cool things! You'll be able to spot me anywhere -- just look for the pink Pit Vipers!
Betty Lou Nelson (freshman): I'm a soccer player, kayaker, skier, and as of this year robotics rookie who's known to many as Panda. I have no idea what I want to do with my life but I'm only a freshman so I've got time to dream up some crazy plan. In the meantime, I am ready to have some fun and I am so excited for my first ever year of robotics!
Willa McLaughlin (freshman): Willa stays busy. She loves running around the woods, basketball court, kitchen, track, and now the shop. A writing fanatic and big fan of dance parties and world peace she is very excited for her first robotics season. Although she hasn’t found exactly what she wants to do she is pumped to get to know new people and to learn about programming and the engineering world.
Trevor Collins (freshman): I'm a rookie member with experience in FLL programming and design. I am interested in Lego stop motion. I am also an avid Star Wars Fan and super pumped up for the Rise of Skywalker film.
Owen Tattersall(freshman): This is Owen's first year on the team. He loves "making stuff", playing baseball, and soccer. He may be the shortest member on our team but he makes a huge difference when it comes to fabrication and design.
Sean Rubesh (sophomore): Hi! My name is Sean Rubesh, but I am also known as Spoon, STS (Don't ask), Little White Sean (Yep, I was that kid), SeansterMonster (My personal favorite), and countless other nicknames that I have picked up over the years. Anyways, as for what role I have on the team, I help in designing the robot and putting it together once an idea has been agreed upon, and I am also one of the main drivers at competitions.
Ahmira Elyard-Jaeger (sophomore): Ahmira is our amazing safety captain, she always keeps us on our toes and is always willing to give a helping hand. She is interested in fabrication, media, and strategy. While she is not in the shop, she typically has her nose in a book and is secretly planning world domination.
Devon Bernacki (sophomore): Whenever Devon is not outside mountain biking, trail building or skiing. He is at school, doing morning band, soccer, and robotics. Despite doing all of this, he still has time to come up with ideas for a robot and spend his nights working on building a robot. He does everything from design to driving, and a bit of added dancing during the competitions.
Tyler Collins (junior): Tyler is always spending time at a whiteboard dreaming up airplanes or robots. While we may not stop at Five Guys at competitions, Tyler has not let left us yet although he may either abandon us to watch Star Wars: The Rise of the Skywalker or become our secret weapon with the Star Wars themes challenge this year.
Evan Tattersall (junior): Evan is a returning member who loves to sort bolts and programming, but only programs outside of robotics. When he is at the meetings he just can't resist getting his hands on the robot. He stays busy, running back and forth from robotics to cross country or track.
Clara McMahon (junior): Known as Big Dawg, this queso lovin’, crazy mockup buildin’, wannabe Italian, will often be found munching the snacks and operating the tablesaw. This is her third year on the team and she never fails to keep us laughing.
Eileen Wendell (senior): A do everything, outdoor enthusiast, robotics loving, human, spending the first semester of the year studying abroad in Spain. But no worries, she made sure she’ll be back in time for build season. On the team she tends to spend time doing just about everything possible. Some days hopelessly trying to program, others spent fundraising and writing GoFundMe bios, adding LEDs to the robot, and others helping with strategy or fabrication. In the future she is hoping to save the world through civil or mechanical engineering with a focus in environmental engineering.
Naomi Elyard-Jaeger (senior): Chasing waterfalls in a kayak, pursuing the hippie lifestyle, and wiring up electronics boards keeps Naomi quite content. This year she spent her first semester of senior year traveling across Canada and Costa Rica with World Class Kayaking Academy but is returning for her fourth build season. Her goal after high school is to backpack across South America, kayak in Africa, and sail across the South Pacific, and become a teacher.
Lillie Goodson (senior): Whether she’s running after a soccer ball, running on trails, or running a river in a kayak, Lillie is always on the move. She always keeps the team fed with different baked goodies and loves people, power tools, and the politics of robotics.
Scott VanLaar (senior): The radical broski who never fails to make puns about everything and anything. While Scott may have had some trouble coming up with a bio, he has plenty up his sleeve when it comes to programming, jokes, and spicy food. With the programming bug, Scott is interested in going to college and studying computer science.
Mentors
Brett Logan: Brett is our nuts and bolts EMT, with keys to the hardware store, we always have access to emergency parts. Also known as the snack man we have a steady supply of Cheez Its and cookies. He has been helping this team for years, encouraging students to dance, If you ever have any questions about the rules of the game or how to pack a trailer, Brett is the man.
Sally Wells: “The Cat Came Back”. She just couldn’t stay away. Sally coached Team 3711 for five years before retiring from her teaching career. She keeps returning for the fall season to help with Girls’ Generation competition, fundraising and prepping for our Bunny Bots competition in December. We even convinced her to leave her winter home in Costa Rica to join us in Houston for the World Championship. We’re hoping that she’ll be in Houston with us again.
Rod Nelson: Our fearless leader Rod Nelson (aka Dr. Doom, although we’re looking for a new one) has a M.S. in electrical engineering from WSU, 1972. Rod's career included testing missile guidance systems, monitoring nuclear reactors, controlling windmills and optimizing sawmills. He has never stopped chasing windmills (ie Don Quixote), so now he Coaches our Robotics Team when he is not foraging for mushrooms. His famous mottos are “assume it doesn’t work until you test it” and “If you leave it til the last minute, it only takes a minute”.
Dennis Hill: Dennis has 3 years experience as a FIRST Robotics mentor. He grew up in nearby White Salmon and received his engineering degree in Aeronautics and Astronautics from the University of Washington. Dennis moved to Trout Lake after retiring from a 40 year career at the Boeing Company in Seattle where he held numerous positions in engineering, computing and management. With all this retirement time on his hands, there’s nothing he’d rather be doing than helping high school students build a robot.
Dennis McMahon: Spent 28 years developing software in the mining industry, then switched to digging for bugs in sawmill optimization software. Ex-alpinist, ex-bike racer, and couple other 'ex' things until having kids knocked some sense into him. Embraces both primitive and modern technology (ignores all the stuff in-between). Still not sure what he wants to do when he grows up.
Terry Schmid: In his youth Terry could usually be found driving farming equipment all around Trout Lake Valley and breaking the machinery on rocks. How the tables have turned! Now Terry is the one driving and fixing the tractors that break rocks. Although demolishing rocks is fascinating, Terry spends what seems like an equal amount of time in the shop making sure we don’t build a robot that will fall apart as soon as it connects to a computer.
Steffen Furholm: Software engineer at a startup, but also has an interest in mechanical engineering and electronics. Spends his spare time with the robotics team, in front of a computer, on a bike, designing next years Christmas light show, or when there’s time left over, with his wife and kids. According to Steffen, the correct number of bikes to own is n+1.
Jason Markham: Jason is his name and programming is his game. He is the most positive asset on our team, and our chaperone on coffee runs. After studying electrical engineering and fine arts at UC Santa Cruz, Jason is now one of the Bros at Nelson Bros. In the very few moments he is not typing on a keyboard with a computer in his lap, he is mountain biking or trail running or watching us struggle to debug code on our own.
Trout Lake Valley:
Trout Lake is a small town located at the base of Mt. Adams.(http://mtadams.tv/) Surrounded by forests, rivers, old lava flows, it is truly a beautiful place. (There are also aliens and a friendly Sasquatch, look it up on YouTube). It is a hub for hiking, kayaking, mountain biking, and many other recreational activities. The community is incredibly supportive, the huckleberry smoothies are to die for, and there are more cows than people. Summers are spent jumping into freezing glacier water and designing robots for the local fair.
Trout Lake School:
Trout Lake school is a K-12 school with 300 students in total. Students aren’t only from Trout Lake, some are from neighboring towns, such as BZ, Husum, Glenwood, and White Salmon. The high school has a whopping 76 students who are all involved in just about everything. Sports are a very big deal at TL, but we are very fortunate to have a great group of kids interested in robotics and the support for the program has been awesome.
Co-organizers (3)
Rod Nelson
Organizer
Trout Lake, WA
Ethelyn Beeks
Beneficiary
Eileen Wendell
Co-organizer
Dennis McMahon
Co-organizer