Electric Car Club Charges Forward at Goodwood Race
The Colfe’s Electric-Car Club team enjoyed a thrilling day at Goodwood motor circuit taking part in the Greenpower challenge competition.
The race was the culmination of two terms of work from E-Car Club, made up of a dedicated and enthusiastic group of Year 8 pupils supervised and supported by students from Year 12. The group built the cars from scratch, using kit provided by UK charity Greenpower Education Trust who run the race day.
Two cars were raced by the Colfe’s team against a field of 74 competing cars, with the objective of completing the circuit with full battery power deemed more important than reaching the highest speeds. Both cars successfully completed the two 1½ hour distance races, the best completing 21.26km with one set of batteries, with speeds of up to 25kph.
Mr John Fishwick, Head of Physics and E-Car Club lead, said: “Congratulations to the team for a fantastic achievement. They showed commitment and focus when building the cars over the course of the year, and excellent teamwork and co-operation on race day itself. The team had even secured sponsorship from Amspeed which helped them win the “best presented team” award on the day.”
The team members were very enthusiastic about the club, and just as proud of their achievement:
“Figuring out the instructions and getting the motors to work was a challenge but building and racing your own car was phenomenal. Race day saw us work together as a team so well, helping each other to be organised and giving each of us a turn to race the cars.” Ruth, Y8
“This experience has been really good fun. I would definitely encourage people to join the E-Car Club. It helps with so much at school too, with Physics and Design & Technology. Designing the bodywork was a chance to have some creative free rein too.” Jemima, Y8
“Race day was excellent. Seeing the other teams’ cars was so exciting, and there was such a nice buzz of sportsmanship throughout the whole event.” Eleanor, Y8
“The whole project was lots of fun, and supporting the Year 8 students was an excellent experience. There were a few hurdles to overcome with the electronics when building the cars so it was extremely rewarding to get them built and raced so successfully.” Cillian, Y12
