Team Orion Racing of KJ Somaiya College of Engineering (Mumbai) went home on a merry note clinching the first edition of the JK Tyre Formula Design Challenge (FDC) at the Kari Motor Speedway in Chettipalayam here recently.
It was not an easy victory though for the team. It had to compete against 900 engineering students from 36 colleges spread across the country to come up trumps. The competition which started on January 20 had all the thrills and, the enthusiasm and excitement were quite evident among the participating students.
The last two days of FDC saw temperatures rising with close encounters among the teams across three key events namely autocross, skid pad and endurance. On the final day, the flagship event, the endurance event declared the Mumbai team as the first JK Tyre FDC winner.
The designs by the respective colleges were evaluated by an esteemed panel. It had Ian Thomas, a man with a rich experience in international motorsports, Maria Bonilla-Torres, System Designer of Robert Bosch GmbH and Felix Scherke, Research Engineer at Daimler.