"8. All teams present at the tournament must participate in judging sessions. Teams members present at the tournament who elect to miss a judging session to work on the robot will disqualify a team. A sick team memeber not participating in the tournament is acceptable."
Looks like a valid case need to be presented about the missing team member, else the people in judging room could assume above. My interpretation was based on this. But Steve responded, so follow that. I'm learning a lot from this forum/listserv.