The eighth and final day of the Sasol Solar Challenge ended on a spectacular note at Cape Town’s V&A Waterfront on Friday 16 September with the Brunel team of Delft University from Netherlands (4228,2 km) beating the Agoria Team from Belgium (4189,9 km) to secure a fourth consecutive win. South Africa’s Tshwane University of Technology (TUT) team came third with a distance of 2682,4 km, a sterling effort, considering that they had to operate on a fraction of the budget of those of the overseas teams.
The final mandatory stop of the challenge was in Caledon on Friday morning. Spectators had the opportunity not only to get a closer look at the spectacular cars, most of which resembled flying saucers, but also to interact with team members. During this time the cars undertook regular loops along the N2 and R406 to rack up extra kilometers.
The overseas teams worked with military precision within the cordoned-off areas, which nobody, not even the drivers, were allowed to enter during the time between loops. Only two team members who attended to the cars were allowed. The solar panels were raised and regularly sprayed down with water to rid them of dust particles, which could affect their efficiency.
Most of the drivers were young post-graduate mechanical engineering or aircraft technology students. Ronan Beauthier of Team Agoria told Hermanus Times: “It’s my first time in South Africa. I came out a month before the race to help prepare and test the car. It’s been a tense and exciting race.”
Laurens de Boer of Brunel said: “It’s been an amazing experience. The variety in the countryside is absolutely stunning. The challenge because of the mountains etc. was huge.”
Carl Brand of TUT said they competed against two of the best teams in the world. “A big part of our race was to bring awareness of solar energy. In small towns especially, kids tend to ask many questions in this regard.”
Demi van Kampen, formerly part of Brunel’s marketing team, was the only female driver this year. “I wanted to get more involved with the car itself, and what better way than to drive the car. Just the idea that we can drive the whole route on solar power is amazing.”
Drivers also spoke with a group of science students from Swartberg Secondary School, explaining facts in a fun and interactive way. Camilla Davids of Swartberg said: “We have never seen anything like this before. We can learn about solar power and an environmentally friendly way to generate power so that we don’t have to worry about Eskom anymore.”
Rob Walker, Sasol Solar Challenge owner and director, said the challenge had gone really well. “It’s been amazing to see the support for the teams and the challenge itself. We’ve had fantastic education programmes and wonderful engagement with the towns we went through. Each team had a community manager available to share knowledge, to encourage kids to stay at school, stay focused on the STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) subjects and build projects of their own.”