Engineering students at the University of Hertfordshire have finished in 17th position out of ninety-seven world-wide competitors and have been placed in the top five UK teams* in the British leg of the international Formula Student competition, held at Silverstone between 9 and 13 July.
Formula Student sees teams from across the world design, engineer and manufacture racing models – this year, UH Racing, part of the School of Engineering and Technology, entered their most technologically advanced car to date, UH17.
The competition started with the dynamic events, which saw the team take part in skid pad, acceleration, endurance and efficiency and sprint. The static events included cost, manufacturing and sustainability, design and business. Without any dramatic crashes or technical hitches, this is the first time in three years that the team has completed all of the events, also winning the award for the most fuel efficient internal combustion engine car. A class 2 team also took part in the static events with a virtual car**.
Dr Howard Ash, senior lecturer at the University of Hertfordshire, said: “These are fantastic results for the team, who gave it their all throughout the five day competition. To be able to compete in all of the events shows the enormous talent and knowledge base our final year master’s and undergraduate students have in creating and racing such a technically advanced car.”
The competition was not without its challenges for the team though. They struggled with their brake test to be allowed to compete in any of the events – having failed to pass it on Friday; the team had to finish the test on Saturday morning, which was quickly followed by the first of the events.
UH Racing team leader, Dan Cooke, added: “I'm incredibly proud to have worked with the team to get to where we are and with what we have achieved. We know what we need to do to make it an even better event in Germany.”
UH Racing will compete at the upcoming Formula Student Germany competition between 29 July and 3 August 2014, where they were ranked top UK team last summer.
Further information on UH Racing and the Formula Student competition can be found on the University of Hertfordshire’s UH Racing website, www.racing.herts.ac.uk.
