Let’s start with Guitar Hero, a good physical representation. Web Applications holds Wii/Xbox contests semi-regularly and has been conducting a Guitar Hero Tournament for the past couple weeks. Each person gets three opportunities to play a song per week, the highest score for that person is then recorded for the week. This week marks the end of week 4. Well, Rob has been asking to play Guitar Hero since he joined the company over a year and a half ago. During the vast majority of that time he would have won the contest easily with his superfast guitar-playing hands. Unfortunately, Guitar Hero did not come quite fast enough for Rob, and time let in a new contender for the GH Throne. Let’s crunch some numbers.

There are three groups, Easy, Medium and Hard; Rob is, obviously, in the Hard Group. The average ‘Easy’ score is 33747, in the Medium group this number is 90543, and in Hard the average is 132609. Keeping that in mind, Rob is second in the Hard group, averaging a solid 20,000 points above the average and soaring 50,000 points over the third place contestant. Two months ago this would have ensured a solid victory, but unfortunately though Rob’s fingers move so quickly while playing Guitar hero that my vision blurs, there’s also an alternative high-roller, Ashley, who is averaging almost 30,000 more that Rob per song. Ouch.  Read more about that here.

Fastest fingers aside ( WWTBA Millionaire might be the game for you!) let’s move on. Do you know a sport that requires highly honed reflexes? A sport with an internal office league? A sport like…SQUASH. Oh yes, Rob is definitely one of the kings of the Squash court. An intense sport requiring both mental and physical prowess, it is certainly challenges those response times. Rob is currently in third place behind the more seasoned professionals Andrew and Nick. Word on the street is that Rob might implement an attack strategy shortly; I’ll keep an eye out for those results.

In a less visible, though no less palpable, way Rob has zoomed through the ranks here at Web Applications. He started here as a software developer in January of 2009 and now has recently been made a Senior Engineer. Very quickly after being made a Senior Engineer an office reorganisation saw Rob switching teams and gaining some Software Engineers of his own to look after. He says his job hasn’t changed a whole lot since becoming a Senior Engineer other than looking after the Software Engineers, but that might be because he’s still working on some of the big issues he was working on before his team changed.

Rob likes to keep himself as flash fast as possible, which is probably why he is so into keeping healthy. Whether it’s through exercising at the gym (fun!) or eating right through the science of nutrition (boring, very boring), Rob maintains his peak performance.

In the spirit of the word *flash* I’m going to end with the Murder Mystery Dinner and Event. There may (or may not, your choice) be some fancy dress on show. In many ways I feel that fancy dress will enhance the atmosphere of the night. So, will Rob L break out the flash-wear for a night of Gangsters and Guns? If others decide to dress up, there’s a Bugsy Malone costume with his name on it.