The 2005 American Solar Challenge is nearing completion, with 17 teams competing to go from Austin, Texas to Calgary, Alberta. The race's website has the usual information about teams, car tech, and daily race summaries, but a particularly interesting feature is the inclusion of GPS tracking data on all the vehicles, updated every few minutes. As these are timed trials, not neck-and-neck to the finish line races, there won't be a thrilling moment when #3 MIT makes its move to pass the University of Michigan (#2) and University of Minnesota (#1). Maybe next year.

I saw the unveiling of the Stanford Solar Car, Solstice, and took a bunch of pictures. You can see the inside and outside of the car here:

http://macroscopic.org/gallery/Solstice-StanfordsSolarCar

john humphrey
macroscopic.org

Posted by: John Humphrey on July 25, 2005 12:55 PM

The first place (U.Michigan) and second place
(U.Minnesota) were separated by only 11:52
(m:s); pretty close, over 4000 km.

The NASC rayce is more akin to endurance
racing, since the vehicles are limited to
the posted highway speed limit.

Posted by: Thomas Terashima on July 28, 2005 1:20 AM