Welcome to the 2nd round 2 battle in Heat 3 of the Fowler Fic War Series 5 and today we see Yet Another cut Above The Rest going up against Sengazanken.

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Both robots move straight towards each other from the start, both obviously having the idea of preventing their opponent spinning up, whilst both losing aggression levels. It€™s Sengazanken who gains more from this though, as with the superior shape and power for pushing, he slams YACATR into the wall and into the angle grinders, causing sparks to fly off one of YACATR€™s truncated pyramid-shaped wheel pods.

AJ doesn€™t respond too well to this onslaught, traversing his way out of a tight situation and spinning up the dual-contact area disc to a reasonable speed, Tony turns Sengazanken to face him with the hinged wedge and comes straight at him with it. The result is points for both parties, as on impact a small gash is left in the wedge of Tony€™s machine, however the wedge pulls him up regardless of the impact and Tony ends up underneath the side of YACATR, possibly doing damage to the underbelly but invisible to the rest of us.

He drives across the arena and slams him into the wall once more, where YACATR flops onto his side, but the shape merely allows him to fall back right way up once more. Sengazanken wastes no time in preventing AJ from doing what he did before however, and gets underneath the discs slamming the discs into it, causing sparks to fly once more, before slamming him into the pit release button.

The siren sounds and the pit as ever descends, though with slightly less grace than usual. However in trying to reverse , he drops YACATR off the hinged wedge, and AJ moves away to get the disc up to speed. Tony chases after him to try and stop it spinning up too fast, but as he charges in, AJ moves his machine, just slightly and the attack hits the side of the hinged wedge, bending the hinge itself slightly and the slight movement, sends the wedge into the disc, preventing either of Tony€™s front discs from working.

The impact has slown the disc down enough though that Tony can come in with the wedge again though, and he attempts to charge straight underneath YACATR once more. Sengazanken appears to have been slightly unbalanced and veers, ever so slightly to the right, this is still enough to get under the wheel pod of YACATR however, and begins once again moving him towards the pit. The bottom corner of the wedge is still digging into the arena floor and cause Sengazanken to move away from its intended destination, which soon leads to problems when he drops AJ€™s machine once again not far from the pit. This gives AJ a chance to spin up his disc ready for Tony to try and come in again.

Tony decides to reverse this time as he feels that it may be easier to drive, which it soon proves to be, reversing straight back into him, only to be immediately met by the disc. The impact is huge, a massive gash being put in the side of Sengazanken, who flies off. But AJ loses control of his machine from the impact, and ends up spinning right over the edge of the pit. One wheel is stuck on the very edge. He tries to gain purchase but only ends up pulling himself further over the edge. Swaying he tries to get himself into a position to escape, but a massively slowed down Sengazanken, steers his way back into the frame. A little nudge, another little nudge, each one pushing YACATR closer to oblivion.

Finally, AJ gains some purchase, and begins to pull his way out but the limping Sengazanken once again nudges him back over the perimeter€¦ this can€™t go on for much longer, and thankfully it doesn€™t as with one last slightly more powerful nudge, Sengazanken drops YACATR into the pit.

CEASE

Well, YACATR was teetering, tottering and eventually out, but he put up a better than good fight at points of that match. However, with a lot of repairs to be made, it€™s Sengazanken that go through to the Heat Final!

And so to that heat final where it€™s

Whirligig 4.0. (5) v Sengazanken

Thoughts, Tactics, Predictions, Condoms?