Shockwave shocks Thor on Robot Wars

SHOCKWAVE won the second heat of Robot Wars 2016 to join Carbide in the series Grand Final.

Shockwave – winner of the second heat of Robot Wars 2016.

The newcomer from Reading defeated veteran robot (and New Blood Grand Finalist) Thor in the heat final after the latter had gone undefeated prior to the final bout.

Both Shockwave and Thor advanced from the heat’s opening group battle which saw the demise of DisConstructor (which lost in its opening battle of the Seventh Wars) and Seventh Wars and World Championship Semi-Finalist Tough as Nails, the only non-British (Dutch) robot in the field of 40. Shockwave pitted DisConstructor early on whilst Thor was grabbed by Tough as Nails. However Thor and Shockwave managed to push Tough as Nails up onto the arena wall where Thor’s axe blows were enough to immobilise the Dutch competitor before pitting it.

The second group battle saw M.R. Speed Squared and Foxic advance at the expense of Draven and Chimera. The Stinger-like Chimera’s exposed tyres were ripped to shreds by M.R. Speed Squared’s spinning blade before it set about immobilising Draven. Foxic managed to survive the battle unscathed despite struggling for traction on the arena floor.

M.R. Speed Squared’s (R.) first hit on Chimera.

But all was not well for M.R. Speed Squared afterwards as the team discovered many of the five-week-old robot’s bearings were damaged. M.R. Speed Squared took on Thor in the opening head-to-head battle. Thor kept close enough to M.R. Speed Squared to prevent its blade from rotating properly and pushed it around the arena into Dead Metal, the flame pit and the floor flipper (which flipped both robots) before M.R. Speed Squared eventually drove itself into the pit, giving Thor three points for the knock-out win.

Thor (R.) and M.R. Speed Squared are both flipped by the arena floor flipper.

Shockwave picked up three points for pitting Foxic in their first head-to-head contest. Little Foxic surprised everyone by pushing Dead Metal across the arena!

The two winning robots (Thor and Shockwave) met in the next battle after both teams modified the front of their robots prior to the contest. Both robots suffered damage, Shockwave from Thor and Thor from Matilda. Thor won the judges’ decision and two more points.

Thor (C.) takes damage from Matilda (L.) after damaging Shockwave.

After the fight Shockwave’s Will Thomas injured some of his fingers on his robot as the team extracted it from the arena.

That bruising encounter was followed by perhaps one of the most boring and poor battles in Robot Wars history. M.R. Speed Squared beat Foxic on a split judge’s decision after not much happened.

Foxic was on a mission to cut Thor’s axe off in their head-to-head battle. Sadly for Foxic it was Thor’s axe that immobilised it right next to the flame pit and Dead Metal. After the house robot exacted its revenge (and ‘Cease’ was called) Matilda flipped Foxic into the pit. With three more points Thor advanced to the heat final.

The last head-to-head was a winner-takes-all between Shockwave and M.R. Speed Squared. Shockwave was in total control throughout, flipping its opponent twice and pushing it into the house robots too. M.R. Speed Squared was finally pitted and eliminated.

At the end of the head-to-heads Thor had eight points, Shockwave six, M.R. Speed Squared two and Foxic nil.

Thor went into the heat final against Shockwave as the favourite, but disaster struck when Shockwave rammed Thor into the arena wall rendering all but the axe useless. Shockwave pushed Thor into the pit to claim its place in the Grand Final.

Shockwave (R.) pits Thor to advance to the Grand Final.

Trivia

• Team Danby (Foxic) competed in the Second Wars’ Featherweight Championship with Deadline.

All images from robotwars.wikia.com.