Elevated Bridge B/C

[Littleboy]

I hope I do good too!!!!!!!!

[Balsa Man]

finished my state bridge for saturday and it weighs 9.4grams and was pretested to hold all the weight. too late to make it lighter. Hoping for a medal w/ about a 1600 eff.

That's a very respectable number - good job and good luck!

[matthew8817]

I won the Nebraksa state competition with and efficiency of 753. the second place score was 486. i think third place was 350. if 1600 is only a "very respectable number" and not utterly amazing, then im screwed at nationals.

[lllazar]

I won the Nebraksa state competition with and efficiency of 753. the second place score was 486. i think third place was 350. if 1600 is only a "very respectable number" and not utterly amazing, then im screwed at nationals.

Huh, dont sweat it man...the top 10-15 should be over 1000, but after that, it drops to 500 by #20. At least last year did....this year will probably be more competitive cause its been 2 years of bridge now. Most of the bigger Sci Oly states are more competitive, like Michingan is somewhere in 2500 for first in C div?

Anyway, i won Illinois with a 972, but Bridge is not at all competitive here because honestly, Bridge and the balsa events in general are pretty uncompetitive compared to other build its...at least at state. At regionals, everyone was terrible - i got first with a 667 - second place was a 5 pound BRIDGE, built of oak.....that's how dumb kids are at our regionals. Its mostly like a get fired up the week before the competition kinda thing in our region...which i hate cause id really like to go to nationals...

[Balsa Man]

I won the Nebraksa state competition with and efficiency of 753. the second place score was 486. i think third place was 350. if 1600 is only a "very respectable number" and not utterly amazing, then im screwed at nationals.

Well, "only" is your words, not mine.
By "very respectable", I mean, well, just what I said, and as a real compliment.
Utterly amazing is, of course, a.....subjective term. Personally - and that's all it is, for B-bridges this year, I'd apply that term to the 2000 and up ones.
Take a look at the C- Nat full results from last year that Jest posted a link to, back on pg 58.
Its clear from this year and last that a) B- bridges can be built lighter than C- bridges, and b), that this year's weights are/will be at Nats pretty close to last year's.
I fully expect to see one or two B-s close to 2500 and another....few between that and around 2000. 1600 might medal at Nats....but might not; very likely top 10; very respectable.
I know what it takes to get a B- bridge to ~1500; I think I know what it takes to push that to....16, 17, 1800, maybe even 1900; beyond that.....amazing; some magic mix of design, finding some special pieces of wood, and very precise building.

BTW, 753 is nothing to be ashamed of. It took both good design and good execution to get there. There is lots of good information here that may help you crank that up for Nationals- worth reading and thinking about, and trying. Good luck!

[Littleboy]

States tomorrow!!
About what place do you guys think a 1200 efficency get me? I want to know

[winneratlife]

States tomorrow!!
About what place do you guys think a 1200 efficency get me? I want to know

In MI? I think you'll place, maybe 4th or 5th.

[dragonfly]

States was great today! At the last minute (more like a day) we decided to use a bridge that we hadn't planned to be our competition bridge, and luckily it payed off. Nice job to all those Pennsylvanians out there, and I'll be seeing all of those heading to nationals!

[croman74]

States tomorrow!!
About what place do you guys think a 1200 efficency get me? I want to know

In MI? I think you'll place, maybe 4th or 5th.

Yeah, you'll probably medal. At my regionals, that would've gotten you probably first. The bridge results from our region were posted, and the winning bridge had efficiency 1232.
Here's the full results: http://www.gvsu.edu/mso-r12/index.cfm?i ... 524460AB87
States tomorrow!Hopefully all goes well!

[nejanimb]

Back from States. Bridges was excellent! We managed to defend our gold. =).

Our efficiency is still something of a trade secret (for the next 3 weeks, at least), but I can give a bit of an update on the competition in general. It was very smoothly run (with the exception of one DQ snafu with a C team that was hoping to do decently... they got a little close on the span and when the supervisor told them they were out of spec, even though they wanted to dispute it, they went ahead with testing, which meant, once it broke, it was impossible to continue arbitration...), even though we had a different supervisor than usual (the one we usually have is running the International Bridge Competition at an area school tomorrow). Second place in C division was in the low thousands I believe; my partner saw them test. First place in B division (my old middle school!) was just shy of 1300. I have no idea really of scores beyond that for either B or C.

Congrats everyone, and good luck to Michigan tomorrow!