Team 836, The RoboBees, attended the FIRST Southwest Virginia District event which was held during week one of the competitive season. A total of 38 teams competed at the event held at Blacksburg High School in Blacksburg, Virginia on March 3-5. Originally scheduled for 12 qualifying matches per team, that number had to be reduced at 10 matches for each, stopping after match 64 due to field delays experienced on Saturday. The RoboBees lost their first 3 matches and then made a great comeback winning their next 7 qualification matches leaving them in 5th place going into alliance selection.
Due to the first seeded team selecting the second seeded team, The RoboBees moved up to the 4th seeded team. The RoboBees asked Team 1598 Team Talon from Danville, Virginia, and Team 6326 Baltimore Bolts, a rookie team from Baltimore, Maryland to join their alliance and both teams accepted. The alliance lost the first of their quarterfinal matches, and won their next two allowing them to continue on to the semifinals where they lost due to a wiring issue. The RoboBees made great gains in this competition and have some design tweaks to complete before the next competition in 2 weeks!