The History of E.C. Racing

2005

In 2005 Eltham College entered two teams for the Greenpower Challenge – Mr Wren’s team ‘Evo 2’ consisting mainly of the old hands with the addition of Chris Warrington to help in the pits, and Miraj Ahmed as a new driver. Our friendly opposition are the ‘Beast’ team controlled by Mr Hillary, which is made up entirely of new boys working on a kit car, to train them a bit before they help on next year’s Evo 3 team.

Our first heat, which only Evo 2 entered, took place at the Goodwood Motor Circuit on a blistering hot Sunday in June. We did quite well, securing a Bronze Award for going over 100 miles in the 6 hour limit after a few minor technical problems. In fact, ‘Evo 2’ was credited with a 120 mile final score since the whole race was stopped at one point by an accident. This race alone should enable us to qualify for the final.

The next heat involved both cars going round a 400m athletics track near Canterbury. This was the first race for all of the ‘Beast’ team’s drivers and pit crew, so there were great expectations as our two racers were pitted against 9 other cars. A third place would secure a position in the final automatically. However, all didn’t quite go according to plan. With three opposing cares leaving the track before even an hour had passed, ‘Evo 2’ was sent into the pits early on, sent out again and then ground to a halt. Once we had found that the problem was that the motor had over-heated, we were kindly donated a second by another team, which had retired. We set off an hour later.

Meanwhile, ‘Beast’ was beginning to have problems with the steering after a collision with another car (we were hit from behind!) However, the team preserved, fighting on despite even a wheel falling off at one point! At the same time, Evo 2’s batteries were being worn down due to friction while going round the corners, till after several increasingly slow laps from Miraj Ahmed and myself, the batteries went dead and we decided to call it a day.

Beast still had a second heat to race, and has a very good chance of entering the final, while Evo 2 will hopefully be fairly high up on the grid when we race in the final in October.

We ended the day on a very positive note when the whole of the Eltham College team were awarded the “Team Perseverance and Spirit” prize for their determination not to give up despite the major technical difficulties. To add icing to the cake, ‘Beast’ also won a trophy for the “Most Innovative use of Materials”. The transparent body shell, dashboard and electrical system supports impressed the judges as the whole working and construction of the car could be seen.

This was an excelent start to the seson and evo2 qualified for the final!

 

2004

Eltham College took up this challenge in early 2004, and in a very short time had built a working model of the car, named “Evo 1”. The Eltham Team who manufactured “Evo 1” were Vas Bala, Hamish Greer, Ryan O’Grady, William Oram, Jonathan Smith, Oscar Turner, Patrick Bunnage, Edward Wort, Nathan Allen, Anthony Barron, Matthew Bunnage, Matthew Fok, Jonathan Lay, Mario Nella, Alex Springer, Jamie Williams, Andrew McCafferty and Sean Parrett, with help from Mr Withecombe and all co-ordinated by Mr Wren. The team was divided into four sections, each responsible for body, chassis, steering or transmission. The actual car was started after the Easter break and at this time, they had only five weeks of friday evenings worth of time to build the actual car, ready for the heats.

Once the manufacturing stages had been completed.The car was first tested on the new ‘triangle’ in front of the school over half term, and on subsequent weekends. Despite a few minor accidents, and one slightly more major one, the car was up and running in time for the first heat on 20th June, at the Goodwood circuit.

On Sunday 20th June, the team stepped up to their first competetive race, since the car had been manufactured. Jamie williams achieved the fastest lap of 6 minutes 41 seconds.On the day we finished in 19th positon in our heat , clocking up a solid 98 miles which overall led us to finish in 53rd position out of a possible 72 qualifying cars for the final.

The team recieved a joint award for the GREENEST CAR / BEST DRIVER for the length that Jamie Williams drove the car timed at 2 hours and the length of time the car ran continously on just one set of battaries, in which they lasted 3 hours.

On Sunday 28th September the E.C racing team consiting of six drivers of Jamie Williams, Oscar Turner, Johnathan Smith, William Oram, Hamish Greer, Edward Wort and six pit technicians of Matthew Fok, Matthew Bunnage, Nathan Allen, Anthony Barron, Patrick Bunnage and Vas Bala competed in the Grand Final.

The team got off to a fantastic start where Jamie williams got us up to 15th position. Oscar maintained this, until he reached near the end of his drive where the batteries didn't last to the next pit and he was stranded in the middle of the track, where we dropped to 40th. Both Jonathan Smith and William Oram drove well between them reganing us some lost places up to 30th. Last but certainly not least Edward Wort took the wheel and after being cut up by the recovery vehicle, no less managed to claw the team up to 25th positon which is where we finished.

The fastest lap was by Jamie Williams at 5 minutes 55 seconds, a personal best!!. The car in total covered 49 laps which equates to 117.6 miles in six hours.

A massive CONGRATULATIONS has to go to the enitire team for their fantastic performance!! Well done to you all!!