Whiz Kid: Eric Friestedt, Engineer

Whiz Kid: Eric Friestedt

School/Grade: /Fifth Grade

Parents: Jon and Darlene Friestedt

Whiz Kid Achievement: Took his passion for Legos to the next level by participating in the Orange County Lego League Challenge; his team took first place at the Southern California Legoland Cup Open Tournament, and he won first place being most organized.

Key to Awesomeness: Eric is an avid Lego builder, and this past year, that love evolved into robotics when he took on the Orange County Lego League Challenge. His team, the Bionic Bots, a rookie first year team, earned first place in the Research Category for Body Forward 2010 at the Southern California Legoland Cup Open Tournament. The Body Forward Challenge entailed identifying a real world problem in the biomedical engineering field and then creating an innovative solution to correct it. The Bionic Bots chose a broken spinal cord for their real world problem and came up with an innovative solution.

The Bionic Bots will begin their second season in September. Eric has already begun his research for this year’s challenge, Food Factor 2011. The Food Factor Challenge involves preventing organic and chemical contamination into the food supply chain.

When he’s not focusing on robotics, Eric enjoys playing basketball and baseball, doing Tae Kwon Do, and running. He recently attended summer camp with the Saddleback Running Club and would like to try cross country in the future. He is also a second year Webelo with Scout Pack 818 and recently attended the OCBSA Summer Camp at O'Neill Park. He is an A student, and not surprisingly, his favorite subjects are math and science.

Eric’s innovative spirit makes him an ideal candidate for this week’s Whiz Kid.