With this, Poland has now joined the more than 50 countries where the F1 in Schools competition has been held over the last 20 years. The event gives young people an extraordinary opportunity to discover and pursue their passions for engineering disciplines, improve their interpersonal skills, and prove themselves on the international stage. The winner of the Polish edition of the competition qualifies for the world finals, to be held in Singapore in the run-up to the Formula One race.
'Seventeen teams have been preparing to compete in the national finals. The teams are made up of young people, between 11 and 19 years old,' explains dr hab. inż. Grzegorz Liśkiewicz of the TUL Institute of Turbomachinery, a co-organizer of the event. 'Each team is comprised of 3-6 members with clearly defined roles. Apart from the race itself, the teams are also rated based on how well they do in building a vehicle brand from scratch, the parameters they define, project management, and effectiveness in raising sponsorship’.
Professor Tomasz Liśkiewicz of Manchester Metropolitan University, also a co-organizer of the event and an alumnus of Lodz University of Technology, goes on to add, 'Each team is tasked with designing, with the aid of 3D CAD (Computer Aided Design), a model of the bolide according to the specifications laid down by the International Rules Committee, just as is done in Formula One. The key thing to keep in mind is that the shape of the bolide will determine how fast the vehicle will go.
The Competition step-by-step
Kinga Rudnicka, TUL graduate and another co-organizer of the event, points out, ‘The bolides will race on a special 20-meter track. Each one is powered by a compressed air cartridge. The scoring is based on the race time value and the reaction time value of the person activating the car. We have watched in awe as the participants relentlessly worked for several months and we can hardly wait for the finals to kick off.
All interested in the F1 in Schools Poland competition are invited to apply for participation at kinga@f1inschools.pl.
The project received funding under the Office of the City Of Łódź call for proposals 'Academic Łódź - scientific, creative, multicultural’ (Łódź akademicka – naukowa, kreatywna i wielokulturowa).