Cheering Crowds Line Sioux Falls Streets For Solar Car Arrivals
Got you to look, didn't we? :)
Really, the morning clouds that have plagued this event for several days have caused headaches for the race officials. Teams are spread out over very long distances so the biggest problems for check-point and stage-stop volunteers is sometimes sheer boredom*. The reason for the disparity in racing success, in this writer's view, is that most of the teams are fielding essentially rookie crews. Few schools have been able to hang on to their experienced talent because the last major US race was fully three years ago. A few teams, notably those with very deep pockets, have continued to race in Europe and Australia and have done a superb job of keeping highly-skilled race crews intact. Hopefully Toyota's unrestricted sponsorship will return this race to a 2-year cycle so that teams can hang on to, and improve upon, the experiential learning that is such a wonderful by-product of this event.
*When local media outlets show up, their cutesy little on-camera talent (?) are clearly the best-dressed people seen along the race route (and that especially includes the solar racers). They shoot some videos of a few cars, talk to a sweaty driver, then do their best to get the story straight on the evening news. If we hear of one more on-screen joke about no cup holders in these beasts. we'll scream.
Comments
In today's Pulitzer Prize winning Sioux Falls paper, the Michigan team was listed as Michigan State. So we're definitely not the only university that deals with the occasional identity crisis.
Posted by: Lance | July 17, 2008 06:36 PM