Oh dear; this was always going to be a lets get at Gary thread, even though most of us are trying to be nice about it. A pity that when someone so friendly and active on this forum wins a championship, he cant enjoy it!

Gary - thanks for the clarification about the batteries; I just wondered, it wasnt an accusation! Congratulations on buffering them well enough (teach team Whyachi...) As for the motor, sounds fine to me, we wouldnt complain if a flippers flip gets less powerful as the system ices up. Just wasnt clear from the footage.

As for the business of spinning up, that in no way reflects badly on you (just as Tornado having a go at Razer while it was stuck under the angle grinder doesnt reflect badly on them) - its just another example of the director having what could be considered to be an unfair influence on fights. Perhaps they were thinking of editing out the arena damage, like they did when Growler broke it it in Extreme 2.

Anyway, chain aside (I didnt see this, so Ill have to have another look, but if Gary says there was no damage then Ill believe him) it sounds as though damage certainly goes to Typhoon - although Id say not by a lot, since it was largely self-inflicted. I dont trust the judges as far as I can throw them to spot anything wrong with a machine, though, ever since the Extreme Warriors fiasco (regardless of peoples opinion of the result, and Ive not seen the fight, obvious mistakes seem to have been made).

I *am* dubious about the points for style, if Craig wasnt making that up, but if were sticking to that decision then my feeling is that Gary won the fight (more through Eds doing than his own, although not entirely so, and Typhoon still had to be built to stand up to the punishment) but that between the re-spinup and the house robots the fight itself was unfair (as some previous fights have been).

As for handing over the trophy, I dont think Gary can be blamed for not doing that. Hes not just representing the people in the control booth, but all the people in his squadron who worked on it. I dont think we can complain if he didnt want to deny them the reward for all the work theyd put in without giving them a say - and Im sure the award will do more good in publicity for the cadets than it would on Eds shelf (so long as Gary keeps being active in the FRA, of course!)

So, again, well done Gary, and Ed: you were robbed, but you might have left the keys in the door. :-)

Will we next see Storm 2 with an extension on the lifter so that it can turn over wide robots like Typhoon 2?

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Fluppet