WMG students design the fastest car in worldwide competition

Four teenagers from Coventry have come in first place for designing the fastest car in a worldwide competition.

The team, named ‘Academy Racers’, consisted of: Abi Hirons, Callum Kennedy, Eddie Hodierne and Elias Khimasia, all of whom are students at the WMG Academy in Mitchell Avenue, Coventry. The students spent a whole year designing, building, racing, and testing their miniature Formula 1 car, which they named Titan 22.

The team beat around 26,000 schools from 46 countries to win the competition, in which they were tasked with creating a Co2 powered car which could travel 20 metres as fast as possible. Titan 22 accomplished this in just 1.084 seconds.

The students had been crowned UK champions earlier in the year and subsequently obtained the chance to compete in the championships in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur.

The WMG is a technical college for young engineers which is located in Canley. It is mainly sponsored by the Warwick Manufacturing Group at the University of Warwick and Jaguar Land Rover, alongside other local firms, and certain national companies such as Bosch. It aims to equip its pupils with ‘knowledge, skills and employability’.

17-year-old team member Eddie Hodiern stated: “It was an amazing feeling to know we had designed the fastest car award in the world finals.

“It was an immense amount of pressure to put something so successful together but we worked hard and I am very proud of the team. It was overwhelming to see everyone in the school turn out to welcome us on our return.”

WMG Academy’s Executive Principal Kate Tague has commented: “This is a fantastic achievement and we are extremely proud of Abi, Callum, Eddie and Elias. They have worked incredibly hard and to have designed the fastest car of its type in the world is an impressive feat.

“The four of them have very bright futures ahead of them. They have done WMG Academy, Coventry and the UK proud.”