The robotics team from the Aktivi Children’s Club in Ramnicu Valcea will represent Romania at the international FIRST LEGO League competition, to be held in China next month, with an innovative project showcasing bobsleigh as an Olympic sport.
The eight-member team, most of whom are lower secondary school pupils, qualified for the international robotics competition after impressing the national jury with a project highlighting Romania’s first bobsleigh track, built more than a century ago on Capela Hill in Ramnicu Valcea, as well as the country’s first competition bobsleigh. The sled was handcrafted in Valcea in 1923 for the team that represented Romania at the 1924 Winter Olympic Games in Chamonix, marking the country’s debut in the sport.
The idea for the project began with the team’s chance discovery of the “Avalansa” bobsleigh at the Valcea Village Museum in Bujoreni. This year’s robotics competition theme, dedicated to archaeology, gave the pupils the opportunity to put both their robotics skills and their field research abilities to the test.
“We take part in a running and cycling event called the Valcea Forest Run, which is held at the Village Museum. During last year’s edition, one of our robotics teammates spotted an interesting sled in one of the barns and took a photo. We had no idea what it was, nor did we know that this year’s competition theme would be archaeology. Once we found out the theme, we started thinking about what historical artefacts we had in our town and ended up on Capela Hill. Thanks to our orienteering maps – because we also practise orienteering at the club – we found the ‘stone ox’ (a Roman-era boulder marking the start of the old bobsleigh track), the ice house and the former bobsleigh track. We decided to investigate further and came across a photograph of a sled that looked familiar. We compared it with the photo our teammate had taken and realised it was the Avalansa bobsleigh. That prompted us to learn more about a sport we knew almost nothing about, and certainly didn’t know was an Olympic sport,” said team captain Robert Mesea.
Starting from the idea that they knew very little about the history of the place where they live and that interest in the subject was generally low, the students built a scale model of the Capela bobsleigh track and developed an educational kit. They then presented both in schools across the county and at science fairs as interactive tools to help younger children learn archaeology through technology.
Their initiative also attracted the support of local authorities, who are now considering installing information panels at the site of the former track and restoring the historic bobsleigh displayed at the museum.
For the competition in China, the team has adapted the project for an international audience, replacing both the Ramnicu Valcea track and the original bobsleigh with more universally relevant elements. However, the project continues to focus on the sport in which Valcea excelled several decades ago, while the students have also upgraded the LEGO robot they will use in the competition.
The international stage of the FIRST LEGO League will take place in Beijing from 13 to 16 August and will bring together teams of students aged up to 16 from more than 30 countries. In addition to the team from Ramnicu Valcea, Romania will be represented this year by two other robotics teams.
