Portsmouth Middle School Robotics team anxiously watches a test run at the state championship.

There was a fine cold mist over the Sakonnet as the robot competitors began to arrive at Roger Williams University in the early morning hours for the RI First Lego League championship. They came wearing t-shirts and jumpsuits, lugging laptop cases, props, and Tupperware containers of robot parts, and settled in the "pit," the staging area where they began to do final tweaks on their robots before the competition begins at 11:45.

The scene was tense but professional as the nearly 400 middle schoolers set up their robots, ran practice sessions, and casually – but with a professional eye – wandered the room to check out how their competitors were doing. With 14 different possible "missions" to accomplish on the 93"x45" table in just two-and-a-half minutes, teams had many different approaches and a wide range of designs, all using the basic building blocks of the Lego Mindstorms NXT system.

The Portsmouth Middle School team spent their time perfecting their bowling mission, where the robot traverses the length of the table, turns 90 degrees to release a ball and knock down six bowling pins, and then pirouettes backward to scoot up on a tipping platform.

Opening ceremonies are at 11:15 in the Roger Williams field house, and the PMS Gyzmo Geezers will be competing at 12:15 on Table 1, at 2:05 on Table 2, and at 2:50 on Table 3.

Good luck to all the participants!

PMS team makes final tweaks to robot program.