THE Brunei contingents to the Shell Eco-marathon Asia (SEMA) 2018 comprising students from Universiti Brunei Darussalam (UBD), Universiti Teknologi Brunei (UTB) and Politeknik Brunei (PB) yesterday joined over 120 student teams from 18 countries across Asia-Pacific and the Middle East at the Changi Exhibition Centre in Singapore.
Brunei’s participation at the event is supported by Brunei Shell Petroleum Co Sdn Bhd (BSP) in collaboration with the Ministry of Education (MoE) through UBD, UTB and PB.
The Shell Eco-marathon is a competition for students passionate about developing innovative mobility solutions.
It challenges engineering, design, science and technology students to design, build and drive the world’s most energy-efficient vehicle.
This year, the Brunei teams participated in one category – the Prototype category – futuristic and highly aerodynamic vehicles.
Following a very intensive safety and technical inspection check three days ago, all three Brunei self-built vehicles made it through with flying colours, ready to race the track.
Team Politeknik Brunei’s ‘Yakin 2’ went through four attempts out of the standard allowed before the final day. The third attempt was their best record for yesterday’s race at 117km/kWh. On seat driving, ‘Yakin 2’ at the race track was Nurul Ramizah binti Ramlee.
Gendeavour’37, driven by Fatin Amanina binti Haji Abdul Azis from Team UBD, completed the nine laps, finishing strong with an efficiency of 116km/kWh.
Despite the challenges faced during the first attempt, the team was even more than ready to rise up to the challenge to beat the odds.
Keeping the spirits high and looking forward to winning, the focus now is to work harder and push their limits to achieve better.
Meanwhile, UTB’s Pahlawan III.X has been scheduled to race in the finals joining the other two Brunei teams against the vehicles from the similar category that will be driven by Hamiz ‘Abdulhadi bin Haji Osman.