By Wendi Reardon Price
Clarkston News Staff Writer
Team RUSH 27 Robotics students are putting together the final pieces for their 15th Annual RUSH Regatta at Deer Lake Beach this Saturday, July 9.
Two of their newest members senior Tallon Ansel and junior Charles Goodrich shared their experiences so far and what they are excited for this season.
Ansel shared he was well prepared for the regatta and building a boat with cardboard and duct tape.
“Since I want to do ship building and stuff like it it’s really fun to do designing,” he said. “I have some designs, some creativity into it. For me, it’s been really easy to ease into the regatta.”
Ansel added it’s not his first time building a boat out of cardboard.
“I have built many ships out of cardboard. It’s just an upscale of it,” he said. “It’s making me pretty happy.”

At the time of the interview, Goodrich’s regatta team was getting materials together and also working on another important piece of the event – getting sponsorships for their team.
Ansel said he joined Team RUSH 27 because it will help grow his skills for what he wants to do – go into the military and into naval architecture to build ships for naval defense.
“I have always seen Team RUSH because I am in CSMTech,” he shared. “I heard about them for years, seen them for years and then finally decided I want to do something extracurricular and decided to join the team.”
He added what has also helped is knowing Coach Kyle Hughes for a long time as being part of CSMTech.
“I can say from personal experience Mrs. Hughes and everybody in Team RUSH, I know everyone like family already,” Ansel shared. “Everybody works together great. It is just a well functioning group all together.”
Goodrich, who plans to go into aerospace engineering, had always been interested in robotics and has always been around it. He had been down in the CSMTech part of Clarkston High School more over the last year so was able to become more familiar with the program and the people involved.
“I thought it would be a way to get myself more familiar with things like 3D printing, CAD designs, robot design and building and machining,” Goodrich said. “I have found those things interesting but have had no good way to learn about it. It’s a way to learn about it.”
He added he has participated with both FLL (FIRST Lego League) and FTC (FIRST Tech Challenge).
“It’s nice to be part of something for a long time and be able to continue it,” Goodrich said.
Besides the upcoming RUSH Regatta, Ansel and Goodrich are looking forward to the build season.
“I really like to focus a lot on designing and developing ideas into full projects,” Ansel said. “When build season comes around, and we get to build our robot that’s what I will be most excited for to implement some of my ideas into reality.”
“I am excited for the build season because I like coming up with an idea and seeing it go through all the processes become an actual machine and see how well that machine functions so the entire process,” Goodrich added.
The 15th Annual RUSH Regatta, at Deer Lake Beach, begins at 11:15 a.m. with judging, followed with the boat parade before the teams race. Sponsorships are still available, please contact Kyle Hughes at khhughes@clarkston.k12.mi.us. Concessions are available and all proceeds support Team RUSH John Lafata Heart Scholarship.