On Sportsmanship
One of the greatest aspects of Solar Car racing is the culture. While our races can involve as much strategy and pride for victory as NASCAR and F1, the difference between the attitudes that prevail in our competition are much different. When new people become acquainted with the Solar Car community, they are amazed at the collaboration that takes place amongst competitors. The loudest cheers at this year's race did not occur when the first place team crossed the finish line, but rather when the last team to qualify finally made it onto the track. Perhaps this spirit of friendly competition comes from the nature of our race, trying to do more with less, and training the engineers who will make transportation in the future a sustainable system. In 2003, when the first Gato del Sol did not qualify for the race, the University of Kentucky received the Sportsmanship Award for loaning it's motor to CalSol, the team from Berkeley, who had suffered an untimely failure in their motor. This year it came full circle, as we would not have had the opportunity to compete without the generosity of Northwestern, who loaned us their motor controller after ours had failed. Teams like the University of Minnesota and Stanford University are the epitome of benevolence, consistently offering suggestions and support to less-experienced teams. Because of these attitudes, students are able to gain valuable engineering experience by financing, designing, building, and racing solar-powered cars.

On the Future
While the UK Solar Car Team was founded in 1999, it was not until 2008 that we were first able to participate in a cross-country race. The hard work of our predecessors has led to a highly reliable vehicle, Gato del Sol III. In the future, this will serve as a source of knowledge for new team members and as our testbed for new systems. The team has progressed from a small start-up to a staple student project in the College of Engineering. Our hope is to continue to broaden our reach, involving students from other disciplines at the University of Kentucky. We have begun to grow our business team to better manage sponsorship and public relations. There is plenty of room to expand in the area of media communications, as evidenced by the recent documentary developed by students from the Center for Visualization. There is no limit to what this project can become when approached from different angles, so all we ask of new team members is an interest in a car powered only by the sun. Much of the design work for Gato del Sol IV is nearing its final stages. We hope our newest vehicle will maintain the safety and reliability of Gato III, while demonstrating several improvements in efficiency. In solar car racing, higher efficiency means higher speeds, so Gato IV has the potential to lead us into the winner's circle in the 2010 North American Solar Challenge, and into the playing field for our first World Solar Challenge in Australia in 2011.

Photo by Kassy Lum