Formula Sun Grand Prix concludes at NCM Motorsports Park

BOWLING GREEN, Ky. – You may have heard of Formula One, one of the most popular racing organizations in the world.

However, in Bowling Green, college students are racing a little differently.

Plenty of schools made the trip to Warren County from all around the country for the Formula Sun Grand Prix, one of the most unique races around.

“We’ve got MIT and Texas A&M and Missouri S&T… I mean, there’s a ton of schools here that are being represented. So this is a huge event that’s been going on for a long time… and it’s just needed for us to be a part of it… and to bring something this unique to Bowling Green was a was a really big deal for us,” Zach Rackovan with the NCM Motorsports Park says.

If you were at the track this week, you may have noticed the cars were not as loud as you may have expected. The reason? These cars are completely solar powered.

“They got these cars that look like rocket ships and all this stuff that are covered in solar panels and completely silent, which is really cool for us to see… doing obstacle courses and things on our paddock area. We’ve got a six acre asphalt parking lot that we use for the corporate events and autocross and things like that… so it’s a perfect area to test the dynamics of a car because it’s safe,” Rackovan says.

The University of Florida Gators stood up & hollered as they were able to take home a win for the second straight year.

However, the main winners of the day were the two schools from French Canada.

“For us this is a huge win today. The club has existed for the past 32 years at our school… and this is the first win ever and first place ever in our history… so we’re super stoked as well as… throughout all the teams here, there’s only two teams that come from the same city and that is Polytechnic (Montreal) and they’ve won as well, first place in the other class,” ETS University engineering student Matthew Albert says.

Beyond the racing, it’s all about a sense of community among the teams.

“It’s… pride… pride of… Quebec engineering and… where we’re from to show that sometimes… maybe we’re forgotten all that, but say we can do things to as well,” Albert says.

The teams will travel to Nashville’s Adventure Science Center for a showcase day before hitting the road for Casper, Wyoming on a cross country trip.