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SAN ANGELO – On Wednesday afternoon, Greenville High School’s Iron Lions solar car team rolled into San Angelo – taking first place in the penultimate stage of the 2026 Solar Car Challenge. After completing the 150-mile stretch from Fredericksburg, the team had finished a total of about 540 miles out of the 720-mile challenge and is, so far, in a good spot to take home its eighth national championship.
The performance of the Iron Lions’ direct competitors in the event’s “advanced” division, however, is stiff; with Poly Solar Car from Pasadena, California coming in just behind Greenville’s team on Sunday through Tuesday while Okemos Solar Racing Club from Okemos, Michigan and Palo Alto Solar Car and Racing from Palo Alto, California surged ahead of Poly Solar on Thursday.
This year’s Solar Car Challenge marks the Iron Lions second outing with their self-designed and built car, “Aurora,” after its debut in last summer’s Bridgestone World Solar Challenge across the Australian Outback.
“We start designing what we want the car to look like and then we can actually start making models, shaping the car and really forming it and making those important decisions,” Iron Lions team captain Ethan Kiowski said of the process at the end of the first day’s race in Palestine. “Then we can move to actually producing it and manufacturing all the parts.
“This car, we actually took to Australia and raced it in the Bridgestone World Solar Car Challenge; that was last year. We had some electrical issues that kind of limited what we were able to do, but we still probably got 500 miles on the car.
“We learned a lot from that, and we’re very confident that we have fixed those issues,” Kiowski added.
Those interested in watching the live racing tracker for the last racing day of the Solar Car Challenge on Thursday can visit https://tinyurl.com/3z43v4s3. The official finishing results will be posted on Friday at https://tinyurl.com/37zz2cye.
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The performance of the Iron Lions’ direct competitors in the event’s “advanced” division, however, is stiff; with Poly Solar Car from Pasadena, California coming in just behind Greenville’s team on Sunday through Tuesday while Okemos Solar Racing Club from Okemos, Michigan and Palo Alto Solar Car and Racing from Palo Alto, California surged ahead of Poly Solar on Thursday.
This year’s Solar Car Challenge marks the Iron Lions second outing with their self-designed and built car, “Aurora,” after its debut in last summer’s Bridgestone World Solar Challenge across the Australian Outback.
“We start designing what we want the car to look like and then we can actually start making models, shaping the car and really forming it and making those important decisions,” Iron Lions team captain Ethan Kiowski said of the process at the end of the first day’s race in Palestine. “Then we can move to actually producing it and manufacturing all the parts.
“This car, we actually took to Australia and raced it in the Bridgestone World Solar Car Challenge; that was last year. We had some electrical issues that kind of limited what we were able to do, but we still probably got 500 miles on the car.
“We learned a lot from that, and we’re very confident that we have fixed those issues,” Kiowski added.
Those interested in watching the live racing tracker for the last racing day of the Solar Car Challenge on Thursday can visit https://tinyurl.com/3z43v4s3. The official finishing results will be posted on Friday at https://tinyurl.com/37zz2cye.
Continue reading...
