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Day #2 sees Sunseeker pull into fifth placeJuly 19, 2005 OCHELATA, Okla.--Western Michigan University's solar car, Sunseeker, pulled into fifth place at the close of the second day of racing in the North American Solar Challenge. Day #2 standings are based on the cars' time through the official checkpoint at Broken Arrow, Okla., July 18, and reflect their positions after completing 518 miles of the 2,500-mile race route from Austin, Texas, to Calgary, Alberta. The race began July 17 and will conclude Wednesday, July 27. Twenty teams from the top engineering schools in North America began the race, but the field is now down to 18 competitors. The University of Minnesota moved into first place with a cumulative time of 10:09:33 at the Broken Arrow checkpoint. The University of Missouri-Rolla is in second place and the first day's leader, University of Michigan, dropped to third place. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology and WMU are in fourth and fifth place, respectively, but are just one second apart in official race standings, with times of 11:44:55 and 11:44:56. Teams continued on toward the next official checkpoint at Washburn University in Topeka, Kan. The 6:30 p.m. close of the race day saw the WMU team at Ochelata, Okla., just south of the Kansas border. At official checkpoints, teams stop for 30 minutes to meet with race officials, change drivers and prepare for the next leg of the race. Racing resumes at 7:45 a.m. (CDT) today with a weather prediction of mostly sunny skies in Kansas. Go to www.americansolarchallenge.org and click on "GPS Tracking" to see the current location of each car along the race route. Media contact: Cheryl Roland, 269 387-8400, cheryl.roland@wmich.edu WMU News |
