06 Oktober 2010 Von: www.teamvodafone.com

Triple Eight Technical Director Ludo Lacroix has been an avid patron of the team and was assisting the students with their research as they progressed through a series of regional, state and national finals.

The Australian Zer0.9 Pine Rivers team worked as a part of a collaborative effort with the UAE and scored highly through the trials, taking second place from a grid of twenty five teams in the Championship between the United States, who placed first and Germany who placed third. They also took out the award for best collaboration in the competition.

The engineering and design action-learning project for students took place over four days at the Ngee Ann Polytechnic Centre where teams rotated through a number of challenges, including time trials, reaction racing, verbal presentations and folio judging sessions.

Lacroix was thrilled with the result and believes the team worked extremely hard to get into the Championship which paid off with a silver medal.

“I’m very proud of them. The result is astonishing considering we completely redesigned the car in July to ensure we had the best chance in the final,” he explained.

“I’ve been involved in this initiative for the past two years now and I’m very enthusiastic about it. It’s always a pleasure to pass your knowledge onto young people. We have to remember, they are our future, so we should give them the best possible start.

“The Re-Engineering Australia Foundation has created a very efficient way of giving young students the motivation to embrace engineering. It has definitely guided the students and their friends toward engineering in the future.

“Knowing they got the silver medal and will carry the memories of this experience for the rest of their lives is my reward. It’s not about the win, it’s about the journey,” he stated.

The educational initiative challenged students to use software to design, build and race a miniature F1 car made from balsa wood and powered by a single compressed air cylinder.

They designed, analysed, tested and manufactured the cars using space-age 3D software, industry-specification manufacturing equipment and miniature smoke and wind tunnels.

Pine Rivers State High School Teacher Corey Gieskens said the competition was an arduous process but was extremely fulfilling for everyone involved.

“The teachers and students involved have worked incredibly hard. It’s over and above normal school work but what we got out of it was extremely rewarding,” Gieskens said.

“The whole thing was really exciting. There was a lot of patriotism going on with the teams, which was great fun. We actually bumped into Mark Webber the other night, which was pretty exciting.”

Gieskens expressed his gratitude to Lacroix for his undying effort to ensure the team performed at its best.

“We were really lucky to have Ludo who is such an expert in the motorsport field. He’s given up so much of his own time for this project and his experience has definitely helped us,” Gieskens continued.

“Our prototype was one of the two cars that were presented to Bernie Ecclestone because of Ludo’s design influence. We really couldn’t have done it without him.”

A total of 17 trophies were presented at the Awards Ceremony, attended by F1 drivers Lucas di Grassi and Kamui Kobayashi.

The Challenge is the world’s biggest technology competition engaging three million students across 19 nations, including Europe, North and South America, Africa, the Middle East and Australasia.