Racing for SA
ACKNOWLEDGING that excellent engineers cannot be solely nurtured in classrooms, Formula Student is an international competition that was founded in the USA in 1981 by SAE International as a practical education programme for students to “create objects”. Experience gained in the programme is shown to be equivalent to three years work in the engineering industry, so is clearly a valuable pursuit. And for the first time, thanks to the initiative of the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, South Africa is taking part in the programme and the latest project – to build a single-seater racing car – is well under way.