FTC
Robotics.
Four years in FTC. From Lego motors to captaining the Finalist Alliance at the World Championship Premier Event in Istanbul.
The
Role.
Vice-Captain and Control Systems Lead on FTC Team 19859. I write the autonomous code (Java, PID loops, sensor fusion) that makes the robot think for itself in a 30-second window.
That means debugging at 11 PM before a match when code that worked in practice won't initialise on the competition field. The real skill isn't writing; it's rewriting under pressure.
Before FTC, I competed in WRO and FLL in 5th and 6th grade; that's where the obsession with robotics started.
"The robot doesn't know you're nervous. The code either works or it doesn't."
I also run strategy and scouting: reading opponent alliances, calling configuration changes between matches. Engineering and strategy are inseparable at this level.
Beyond competition, I designed and built 19859.org, the team's official bilingual website, as part of the sponsorship and outreach side of the role. It covers the robot, season, software, and community across English and Chinese.
The Technical
Stack.
Everything in the technical stack below serves a single goal: autonomous reliability. The robot has 30 seconds. Zero human input. Everything below has to work in concert, or the robot's dead on the field.
Scout
Select.
The stack in Chapter 2 powers the robot. I also built the intelligence layer our team uses for alliance selection: a full-stack platform used in multiple rounds of competition.
Alliance Role Detector
Win Probability Engine
Smart Pick Optimizer
Synergy & Fit Scoring
Awards &
Competition
Record.
Didn't make it past qualifiers our first season. This season we captained the Finalist Alliance at the World Championship Premier Event in Istanbul. Four seasons of getting better.
The
Machine.
FTC Team 19859 · 2025-26 Competition Robot
What the code
actually drives.
Every control loop on this page runs on this machine. These are the CAD renders behind it: the same assemblies the autonomous routine is tuned against.
Build. Test.
Compete.
Istanbul,
2026.
Istanbul, July 2026. Teams from every continent. Four years of work led here, and we captained the Finalist Alliance.
Finalist Alliance Captain, and 2nd place for the Innovate Award. Captaining an alliance means the other teams picked us to lead; that judgement came from the season behind it, not one weekend.
- China Nationals: Finalist Alliance Captain
- Control Award & Design Award: dual recognition
- Autonomous routine: 98% consistency across 12 matches
- Four consecutive FTC seasons · FTC Team 19859
Also Explore
The same precision that makes a 98%-consistent autonomous routine works in water too. World #6. Five medals in 2026.
Control Systems Lead and Team Champion. Different arenas, same core skill: build the argument, test it under pressure, iterate.
Built because competition demanded it. OPR, Monte Carlo, Bayesian shrinkage: running on live FTC data at California Invitational.