BOWLING GREEN, Ky. (WBKO) – The National Corvette Museum Motorsports Park hosted the American Solar Challenge’s Electrek Formula Sun Grand Prix. This year marks the first year the park has hosted the grand prix, and teams took over the track from July 13 to July 18.
Participating teams featured college students from across the United States and Canada. The teams had three days to work on their cars before hitting the track on Tuesday, July 16. From there, eight hours each day were allocated for track time. The goal was to turn as many laps as possible over 24 hours of driving.
University of Waterloo student Michael Hanley made the trip from Canada with his team to compete. He is the driver and the team captain of the Midnight Sun Solar Team, running under number 24.
“We’re here to do solar car racing. We’ve been working on this car for two and a half years,” Hanley said. “It (has) been really nice to see that we’ve been able to get on the track.”
The week hasn’t come without its challenges. Wednesday saw heavy rains move into the Bowling Green area during track time, but the racing never stopped. Hanley and his team continued to push through despite weather and mechanical challenges.
“We haven’t been able to get as many laps on (as we’d like). We’ve run into a bunch of electrical stuff, some stuff with mechanical in terms of brakes and steering,” he said. “Overall, it’s been a pretty good learning experience for us to troubleshoot on the fly and see what type of innovations we can make.”
While the cars only top out between 30 and 40 miles per hour, handling and comfort are still performance factors.
“Being able to build a car from scratch and being able to drive it has been amazing,” Hanley said. “It’s quite funny because this thing drifts quite a bit. It’s been fun to try and control that. There’s a lot of videos of the car screeching and whatnot.”
The hope for the event organizers has always been to provide the next generation with a chance to learn in a fun, hands-on, environment.
“This is an experimental learning opportunity for today’s college students that will go on to be tomorrow’s leaders,” said Event Director Gail Lueck. “The teams that demonstrate their roadworthiness and qualify here will then go on to participate in the Electrek American Solar Challenge.”
The American Solar Challenge began in 1990, but the Formula Sun Grand Prix did not become a regular part of the program until 2000. Since the racing portion began, the event has visited legendary venues such as the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas.
“I’ve been in this brain sport, as we call it, for 25 years now,” Lueck said. “Continuing to push the envelope of what is possible… and the next phase for the teams that qualify will be to demonstrate it out on the road by driving 1,500 plus miles from Nashville, Tennessee to Casper, Wyoming [over 8 days].”
Following the Formula Sun Grand Prix’s conclusion, the cars will be on display at the Adventure Science Center in Nashville and open to the public before the official long-distance challenge begins on July 20.
For a full schedule and event details, click here.
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