Pinnacle Season Opener at KU
Lawrence, KS; HS/MS Blended
Remaining: 36
📌 Event Details
Season: 2026-2027 Season
Code: ACH20264654
Timezone: America/Chicago
Registration: 07/01/2026 - 07/24/2026
💳 Payment Deadline: 07/17/2026
📍 Location
LEEP2 Engineering Complex
1536 W 15th St, Lawrence, KS 66045
Lawrence, KS 66045
Eligible Grade Levels: High School, Middle School
📋 General Information
This is a MIDDLE/HIGH School RECF Achieve Tournament and will be held at the University of Kansas in Lawrence, KS. This event is an RECF STEM World Championship qualifier, with 4 spots to the World Championship.
This event is open to all RECF Achieve teams from any region. The event will be held in KU's LEEP2 building. We are looking to offer a very high quality event for all teams attending. Each team will be scheduled for a minimum of 9 qualification matches. The event will include dedicated competition, solo match, and practice field(s).
If you have any questions, please send them as an email directly to jhawkrobots@gmail.com. Multiple people are planning different aspects of this event and this shared email will ensure the right person will receive your question.
Payment: Teams who have not paid by the payment deadline will be moved to the waitlist until payment is received. If your team has issues meeting this deadline, please reach out. Depending on the circumstances, teams may still be able to register and pay after the deadline. If your team needs help paying, please reach out as we may be able to waive the registration fee for teams in exchange for providing volunteers. This opportunity will be provided on a first come first serve basis.
Venue: This event will be hosted in KU's engineering complex (LEEP2). Pictures of the venue are in the image gallery.
Participation and Consent Form: All participants must complete the consent form online before attending the event. Additionally, it is both an RECF and KU policy that all minors are accompanied by an adult.
Waiting List: If this event is full, please add your team to the waitlist. Additionally, if your team wishes to bring more than 8 teams to the event, add your additional teams to the waitlist and we will expand the max organizational limit if there are still empty spots. If this event is full, please add your team to the waitlist. We may expand the event if there is enough demand.
Pits: We ask that parents stay out of these rooms as much as possible as there will be other seating. Each team will have a semicircular table approximately 7 ft in diameter. Each table will have 1-2 outlets. If the event does not fill, each team may receive a full table with 3 outlets. Teams will not have to share a table with a team from a different organization.
Match queuing: There will be a livestream running to the pit room. Pit rooms are only a 1 minute walk from the fields. Each team will be responsible for making sure that they show up to their matches on time. Plan to show up to the queuing table as soon as it opens to your team. We have a tight schedule to keep and will start matches without teams if they are not there.
Food: Teams are welcome to bring their own food to the event. We will provide more details later for lunch but we will likely have the options for teams to order in pizzas.
⚠️ Emergency Info
The event will be cancelled only under extreme circumstances. If this occurs, teams will be notified through email. How we will move forward depends on why the event was cancelled, but we will most likely try to reschedule.🧳 Travel Information
LEEP2 at KU:
Lawrence's closest major airport is MCI and is a little under an hour's drive away. Lawrence is also roughly half an hour away from Kansas city, so if you're travelling in, be sure to check out what some of KC has to offer!
Parking on KU campus is free starting at 17:00 on Friday and all day Saturday. There shouldn't be a sporting event so teams should be able to park right across the street from the venue. Please make sure that you check this page and your contact email prior to the event to confirm parking locations.
🗓️ Agenda
It's a robotics tournament, so as you well know, all times are subject to change. All times are in central time. This schedule assumes a full 40 team event, we will send out an updated schedule closer to the time if it changes.Friday, July 31st (OPTIONAL)
19:00 Venue opens, check-in and inspection open
19:15 Solo matches open, judging begins
21:00 Venue closes
Saturday, August 1st
7:30 Venue re-opens, check-in and inspection re-open
8:00 Opening ceremony begins, check-in and inspection close, solo matches and judging pause
9:00 Qualification matches begin, judging and solo matches resume
12:00 Lunch beings, qualifications pause
13:00 Lunch ends, qualifications resume
15:30 Qualifications, solo matches, and judging ends
15:45 Alliance selection begins
16:30 Eliminations bracket begins
18:00 Eliminations end
18:30 Venue closes
⚙️ Judging Format
Remote Notebook Judging with in-person interviews - All Team Interviews will be conducted in person. Similar to last year, teams will sign up for an interview time slot on the day of the competition. Engineering Notebooks will be submitted to judges digitally. More information on how to digitally submit your notebooks will be sent out closer to the time.
Notebooks are due July 28th at 8:00pm central time NO EXCEPTIONS
🏆 Awards
Tournament Champions x2 (RECF STEM World Championship qualifying)
Tournament Finalist x2
Excellence x2 (RECF STEM World Championship qualifying)
Design
Innovate
Think
Amaze
Build
Create
Judges
Solo Match Champion
Solo Match 2nd Place
Solo Match 3rd Place
Sportsmanship
💵 Refund Policy
If the Event Partner cancels the event:
This will only happen in the event of an emergency or bad weather and we are unable to reschedule. We will provide as close to a full refund as possible in this extremely unlikely event (certain event funds such as the RECF handling fee must be spent before the event occurs and those will not be refunded). If any details regarding the event are changed by entities such as the University or RECF teams may not recive a refund.
If a Coach/Mentor completes registration for the event then chooses to withdraw or not attend:
Once a team has paid for the event, no refund will be given. Teams who do not pay by the payment deadline will be moved to the waitlist and potentially lose their spot. If special arrangements are made for a team to remain registered for the event after the payment deadline, teams will still be expected to pay in full regardless of whether or not that team attends as we will be unlikely to fill the spot on short notice.