Dream comes true for battling Jacob

A STRATFORD-UPON-AVON schoolboy who successfully battled an aggressive form of cancer has had his dream of building his own fighting robot come true.

Twelve-year-old Jacob Groves — who lives in the town and is a student at KES — was diagnosed with Anaplastic Large Cell Lymphoma three years ago after developing a persistent cough.

The diagnosis of this rare form of the disease was a massive shock to his mum and dad, Emma and Steve, and sister Tabby, and meant Jacob was forced to undergo an intensive course of chemotherapy to give him the best chance of survival.

Jacob’s dad, Steve, said: “He developed this cough and it just got worse and worse. They tried him on antibiotics and treated him for asthma but it wasn’t shifting. “When I was told what Jacob’s condition was my heart just dropped, it was like nothing I had ever felt before, hearing something as cataclysmic as that.

“Even at the time they suspected it might have been something to do with his tonsils but when they said it was lymphoma, although I didn’t know exactly what it was, I knew it was bad.”

Jacob’s course of chemotherapy, which was complicated by him developing additional infections, sapped his energy, leaving him sleeping for around 18 hours a day. “He did it because he had to do it, but obviously he detested the treatment. For the rest of the family it was a very anxious time, it was chaos, your routine goes right out of the window,” added Steve.

“When we were told that Jacob was in remission it was good news but it wasn’t the relief that you might think because he was still quite poorly.

“He had been nuked for four or five months and it took a bit longer for him to get his strength back.

“His condition will be monitored for the rest of his life, but today he is just like any other healthy 12-year-old boy.”

Jacob’s mum, Emma, added: “Jacob found his treatment incredibly hard. He actually turned around and said: ‘I wish somebody brave had cancer and not me’, because he just knew it was so hard, he just really struggled to deal with it.

“He is now a changed boy, more serious and in many ways very vulnerable, but having such an amazing experience to block out some of what happened in the past meant so much to him.”

That amazing experience Emma refers to was organised by charity Make-A-Wish UK, which provides once-in-a-lifetime experience for children with life-threatening conditions.

Whilst he was ill the family received offers from the charity to grant Jacob his wish but they decided to wait until he was better before taking up the offer. Jacob, a devoted fan of the cult TV programme Robot Wars, has always harboured a passion for engineering and enjoys making remote control vehicles out of LEGO.

For his special surprise, Make-A-Wish UK arranged for the youngster to work with a company called Robo Challenge to design his own robot, which he named Double Trouble.

Jacob was then invited to compete at the Robo Challenge World Championship for featherweight robots at Gadget Show Live at the NEC in Birmingham.

Steve said: “I think he must have developed his interest in Robot Wars from watching re-runs of the original series because he wasn’t born when it was originally on TV.

“He also likes stop-motion animation, but as soon as Robot Wars got mentioned that was top of his list.”

During two visits to the Robo Challenge headquarters Jacob was taught all the skills required to bring his dream to life. The finished robot, Double Trouble, is wedge-shaped and features a spinning disk designed to inflict maximum damage to an opponent. The robot, operated by Jacob, performed well in the competition, though Jacob says he would like to engineer a flipper into the design in the future.

To top it off shortly before he competed Jacob was whisked off to Glasgow for a VIP trip to see the filming of the new series of Robot Wars, meeting the show’s presenter Dara Ó Briain.

Steve added: “Jacob was made to feel very welcome. He also enjoyed the atmosphere with all the teams working with each other backstage and taking a look at the new beefed up house robots.”

Emma added: “This hasn’t just been an amazing experience, this has the potential to be life changing. “Following on from his wish, not only do we now have an incredibly fun, challenging, rewarding, family bonding hobby to pursue amongst an incredible community — aka the roboteers — Jacob at just 12 is now set on becoming an engineer with aspirations of competing in Robot Wars with a heavyweight robot before he leaves school.”

Inspired by his experiences, Jacob and Steve built a new robot called Mutiny at home and competed at the Insomnia Gaming Festival at the Birmingham NEC last weekend.