From sharing ideas to sharing spare parts, BattleBots teams are a close-knit community.īefore the championship began, I asked Chuck, “Who are your top competitors this year?” Chuck tells me the Onshape model will be valuable to the team for verifying weights, part replacements and any adjustments needed after a battle.Ĭhuck was quick to mention the camaraderie between competitors. I viewed the Ghost Raptor Onshape Document, complete with every configuration of the robot the team uses in competitions. Sponsorship is a big part of the funding, and I’m proud that my company Onshape, a PTC Business, has stepped up to help them out this year. I wasn’t surprised to learn that BattleBots teams regularly spend $25,000-$30,000 per season to compete. I spent some time with Chuck and got to ask a few questions about competing in BattleBots.
(I’d like to give a special thanks to Sabri for getting me into the venue and making sure I knew where to go.)Ĭhuck Pitzer, left, and Richard Doyle take a look at Ghost Raptor’s design.
The pit area before the competition was full of energy as teams readied for safety inspections and interviews.
Team members included Fashiontech Designer Anouk Wipprecht, Software Engineer Xo Wang, Mechanical Engineer Eric Diehr and Software Engineer Sabri Sansoy. This year, Team Ghostraptor was led by Team Captain Chuck Pitzer, Staff Engineer at Fetch Robotics. I was lucky enough to get an up close look at Ghost Raptor by going behind-the-scenes with Team Ghostraptor for the BattleBots 2021 World Championship, which was held Aug. That was just one of BattleBots Ring Announcer Faruq Tauheed’s many fear-inducing introductions for Ghost Raptor in previous competitions. From the Crush-taceous Period, it's Ghost Raptor!" For Discovery Channel, Lewers, Joseph Boyle, Caroline Perez and Wyatt Channell are executive producers, and Paola Espinosa is associate producer."From prehistoric times, it's not a bot, it's a terror-dactyle. In addition to Cowan and Roski, executive producers are Munson, Tom Gutteridge, Aaron Catling and Evan Gatica. The show is produced by Whalerock Industries and BattleBots Inc. A more stacked field of contenders has never been assembled.”īattleBots was created by Roski and Greg Munson. Said executive producer Chris Cowan: “The best team in combat sports are back doing their thing, and the competitive firepower brought to bear by our builders in this year’s quest for the Giant Nut is simply unreal. Meanwhile, returning sportscaster Chris Rose and former UFC fighter Kenny Florian will provide play-by-play commentary, along with expert contributions from Pete Abrahamson, nicknamed the Bot Whisperer, and Faruq Tauheed in the BattleBox as ring announcer. There are shocks and upsets, and heartwarming triumphs over technical and personal challenges. The builders did an incredible job raising the bar to a completely new level of imagination, skill and, frankly, violence. founder and CEO Edward (Trey) Roski added: “This year’s World Championship was the most exciting ever, and the battles are beyond amazing. “Thursday night robot fighting action’s back and better than ever.”īattleBots Inc. “Delighted to kick off the new year and welcome viewers back into the BattleBox with 14 all-new episodes filled with some of the most intense bot battles we’ve ever seen,” said Scott Lewers, executive vp multiplatform programming at Discovery Factual and head of content at Science. Carole Baskin to Investigate Treatment of Big Cats at Joe Exotic's Former Zoo in Discovery+ Docuseries (Exclusive)