The car built by the engineering students from the University of Moratuwa won awards at the world’s biggest student motorsport competition “Formula Student 2016”.
This was the first time a team from Sri Lanka took part in the event worked off at the Silverstone Circuit in the United Kingdom with the participation of over 130 teams from 30 countries.
Over 4,000 students from 32 countries more than ever before competed at Formula Student 2016, with the University of Stuttgart’s Rennteam seizing this year’s title.
The participants for this year’s Formula Student were teams from Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Egypt, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, India, Ireland, Italy, Jordan, Norway, Pakistan, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, The Netherlands, Turkey, UK and Ukraine.
The University of Moratuwa team from Sri Lanka perfectly encapsulated what this world-famous event is all about. With little support, they built a car as they went along, adding piece by piece as more sponsorship was secured, and received their recognition by winning the Best Newcomer in Class 1 award.
The team from the Faculty of Engineering, University of Moratuwa Team SHARK consisted of 18 members led by Team Leader Harshana Kelasha have won three awards. The three awards won included two team awards “Best Newcomer in Class 1” and “Dedication to Formula Student Award” and one individual award for the “Top Individual Driver” which was bagged by Induwara Munasinghe for his outstanding driving skills.
The global competition, run by the Institution, is the world’s largest student motorsport event and challenges student engineers to design, build and race a single seat racing car in one year.
The cars are judged on their speed, acceleration, handling and endurance in a series of time-trial races, while the teams are tested on their design, costing and business presentation skills.