Antweight Championship

Antweight Championship
Structure Information
Number of Competing Robots	7/12
History
Number of times held	2
UK Series	Extreme 1-2 (Series 3 Cancelled)
UK Incumbent Champion	Anty B

The Antweight Championship was a special event featuring antweight robots weighing 150g and under. Taking place in both series of Robot Wars Extreme, the championship was held in a miniature replica of the Robot Wars Arena located in the corner of the pits, complete with fully-functioning hazards such as the Pit and the Floor Flipper.

The first Antweight Championship consisted of a single melee, which was broadcast as part of the last episode of Extreme 1. For Extreme 2, the championship consisted of two heats containing six robots each, with two winners from each heat going through to a final round to determine the champion. The latter was broadcast as part of the Robot Rampage episode, which was dedicated to competitions featuring robots from lighter weight categories. It has been suggested that Series 3 also had antweight robots in attendance, but without clear confirmation of a competition.

Series 3

"I have a vague recollection of there being a small arena - but as no one had ever seen an ant arena before - I don’t think many of us heavy weight teams cottoned on to what it was there for. But there were as it turned out some competitors intending to run Ants at filming ( I didn’t actually notice at first ) But I think later they sat up in the audience- and as they had their Ants and transmitters with then ( so not to lose them I suppose) they got singled out as being some hoodlums intending to crash the show by operating their transmitters.But that was probably just Derek Foxwell getting stroppy as he tended to do and the production crew hyping the whole thing for telly. More like some innocent kids just innocently hanging around with their stuff after their event got cancelled."

— Simon Harrison comments on the idea of an Antweight Championship at Series 3

Antweight robot Tyrant is momentarily confiscated from an audience member at the filming of Series 3, reportedly one of several antweight robots in attendance

It has been suggested that an Antweight competition was intended to have taken place as early as The Third Wars. According to recollections from Simon Harrison and Martin Dawson, an antweight competition was suggested to Mentorn by Adam Clark, with various young teams arriving at the filming for Series 3 with antweight machines. Dawson and Harrison state that many of the antweights present were made out of LEGO, with some using metals and woods, all entered by younger roboteers.

"It was chaos at the studios, there was a load of dancers filming a vid for the Spice Girls (remember them) and Chris Tarrant was doing 'Who wants to be a Silly Mare' the car park was underneath that studio. There was a lot of cars from other shows parked out side. the weather was awful, rained all the time. I think a lot of the audience went home when filming was stopped so that would free up seats for the ant weight teams, makes sense to me, when I spoke to them they wanted a look at the pits , I went and asked but they were not allowed."

— Martin Dawson on his recollection of the antweight roboteers present

One of these such machines was Tyrant, which would make a cameo appearance in Heat M as a robot found in the crowd. However, no antweight battle was ultimately recorded. This may have been due to the filming delays caused by the known behind-the-scenes accident, or there may not have been a formal competition planned. Even Oliver Steeples of the University of Reading, having expressed interest himself, claimed that, as filming dates were being confirmed, antweights would potentially feature, however no further news came about it and the First Antweight World Series was formed in the meantime. Oliver also later claimed that Mentorn wanted heavyweights more so than lightweight classes, having little interest in the concept, which may have been a reason for no antweight competition.

"Since Mentorn want big 100kg robots with lots of weapons I don't think the will be interested in 150g robots running around on 3' square bits of wood. At least the production budget would be cheap and by the time you have 2 drivers, a sound man and a camera there might be enough room for 1 spectator. Quite a way off the NEC."

— Oliver Steeples

Craig Danby, an active antweight roboteer at the time who was present for the cancelled Super Heavyweight competition, asserts that there was no antweight competition planned for Series 3, with other active antweight roboteers from this time period such as Alan Parkin having no knowledge of any 1999 competition.

Extreme Series 1

Main article: Robot Wars Extreme: Series 1/Antweight Championship

The first televised Antweight Championship was filmed in 2001 as part of the first series of Extreme, won by Combatant.

Extreme Series 2

Main article: Robot Wars Extreme: Series 2/Antweight Championship

The second and final Antweight Championship to be broadcast as part of Robot Wars was filmed in 2002 as part of the second series of Extreme, won by Anty B.

Trivia

• Both of the Antweight Champions, Anty B and Combatant, fought against each other in every battle they fought, with each robot defeating the other once, and them both qualifying for the next round in the third.