FRC 2026 - British Columbia

A year after mentoring in FRC 2025, I joined Blue Lightning, a community team of middle and high school students out of West Vancouver, led by parents and volunteers. 2026 was their rookie year — no shop built up over past seasons, no veteran students to lean on, everything from the build process to the team itself starting from zero.

A rookie FIRST Competition team learns two things at once: how to build an industrial-size robot, and how to run the team that builds it. TODO: what you focused on this season — software again, as in 2025, or a wider mentoring role on a team that was standing itself up for the first time.

Here is the Team Website and Team 11149 performance

We competed at the Canadian Pacific Regional from March 4-7, 2026, finishing qualifications 4-6 and ranked 25th of 44 teams, then got picked in the second round by the 7th alliance for playoffs. A rookie team making an alliance at all is a good place to start.