Girton Racing Team
After months of training and preparation, the highly anticipated annual Maryborough Energy Breakthrough finally came around for the Girton Racing Team (GRT). The event consists of display and presentation of vehicles; scrutineering, design and construction; a practice session; and a 24-hour race.
Display and presentation is a prepared performance that is intended to convey our knowledge about the trikes and event preparation to the judges. Scrutineering is the safety and integrity check of the trike, and design and construction is about showing the inspectors the design of the trike. Finally, the practice session gives participants the opportunity to find faults in their vehicle and to practise on the 1.58km track, and the 24-hour race is, well, an endurance race that goes for 24 continuous hours.
The GRT entered three trikes, each competing in different categories. There are two overall categories: HPV (Human Powered Vehicle) and EEV (Energy Efficient Vehicle). Our trikes included a fully electric trike (which currently holds the record for the longest distance completed at Maryborough), a hybrid trike (pedal and electric), and a HPV trike (pedal).
Our fully electric vehicle was named 'Xception' and was made up of an entirely senior team: Harrison Phillips (11 Aherne), Charlie Baker (11 Frew), Christian Iuliano (12 Millward), Lincon Hocking (12 Millward), Matthew Saxon (12 Frew) and Liam Jones (12 Frew).
Our hybrid vehicle, 'InSync' (nicknamed 'Team McQueen') was driven by Seb Loraine (8 Aherne), Hayden Foster (9 Aherne), Eiliyah Daneen (8 Riley), Henry Hall (8 Riley), Chloe Phillips (8 Aherne) and Bella Draper (11 Aherne).
'Intrepid' (or the 'Fruit Trike') was made up of Dylan Currie (9 Riley), Emily Currie (7 Riley), Jack Pickering (7 Millward), Teagan Whiteman (8 Aherne) and Lily Middlemis (8 Aherne).
The event ran in the week after exams (Friday 24 to Sunday 26 November). We all arrived at Maryborough around 9am on Friday to set up on the Jubilee Oval, which has been our campsite for many years. After the campsite had been set up, teams got together to rehearse their display and presentation act.
Unfortunately, the weather decided, once again, to pick the weekend of the event to start raining. This downpour continued throughout the weekend. Fortunately, Friday was the worst of it, and we were able to ride a dry track for a lot longer than we expected. This was great, especially for the EEV team, because they could keep their speed without sliding and wouldn’t come out shivering and wet.
On Friday evening, we ordered many pizzas, just like last year. This gave us fuel for the practice session, which was due to run for two hours from 7:30pm. Although pizza is a great food to many, after Maryborough 2022, when pizza was all we ate for the whole weekend, not many people were excited by the idea of possibly having to go off pizza again.
The practice session gave us a chance to practise riding the trikes in the dark and to become familiar with the track. Our lap times from the trial also indicated where we would be placed on the grid for the real race.
We woke up the next morning refreshed and ready for what was to face us at 12pm. We had a delicious breakfast of bacon and eggs on toast before we all got down to the track at 11am to start placing our trikes on the grid.
The race got off to a flying start. In no time InSync had taken up the first place in the Pedal Electric Open (PE O) category and Xception had also taken first place in the electric category.
However, after about an hour and a half, InSync’s motor broke down. This caused them to drop down a few places as they were forced to pedal for a bit. Fortunately, 15 to 20 minutes later, when the moisture on the track decreased, the motor started up again and InSync was back on track. But the bad luck continued when InSync's and Xception’s motors struggled throughout the 24 hours. With Xception being the priority as they could only rely on motor power, InSync was often sent off pedalling, which caused them to drop down places.
The night was extremely eventful. Riders from many teams decided to go into the barriers for a nap, and some even decided to try and go for a swim in the lake while in their trike.
However, Sunday morning ran quite smoothly and this meant that all three teams would finish the race off in style. Xception finished in second by seven laps behind Bendigo Senior’s 'Known Gnomes'. InSync came seventh overall in their category, a huge effort considering they were essentially a HPV for part of the race competing against those with a motor. And finally, Intrepid finished 16th overall in their category. No one in their team had raced before at Maryborough, so it was a massive effort to finish the race.
We would like to extend a huge thank you to Mr Vernon, Ms Crane, Ms Blanks and Miss Loraine who were the teachers supervising us. We would also like to thank all the parents and students involved. The whole of GRT must also thank Mr Robin Kirby for his truckload of assistance throughout the event and the year. Without him, we would not have even made it to Maryborough and nor would we have any working trikes.
Overall the event was successful, and although everyone left cold and tired, we all enjoyed it greatly.
By Eiliyah Daneen and Henry Hall (8 Riley)
If you want to see how we did, go to multisportaustralia.com.au, and click on a trike to see times and speed. (Filter Categories: Xception - EV, InSync - PE O, Intrepid - B2)
If you want to see how much power the EEVs used, go to eb.org.au.
