Bengaluru team wins national-level karting race

A group of 25 students from the Bangalore Institute of Technology (BITS), KR Road who make up ‘Team Kratos’, the official go-karting team of the institute, have emerged national champions in the Student Karting Championship 2015 which was held in Hyderabad recently.

The Student Karting Championship is an annual event for undergraduate students from around the country. As many as 70 teams took part in the competition, five of them from Bengaluru. Team Drona from Pune emerged as runners-up.  

Avaneesh Srinivas, a member of Team Kratos said, “All the top formula one racers begin from karting. Just being in the competition was a grand experience. Last year, we won at the Kari Motor Speedway competition and we hope to keep up the good form.” The team of 25 students belong to various branches of engineering.  

Teams have to design their karts within a prescribed budget, demonstrating their engineering skills including the use of Computer Aided Design (CAD) software for modelling. The teams then have to go for fabrication following which, the vehicles are brought to the race track where they are subjected to tests and an endurance race. The race takes place over the course of two hours where the vehicles are judged on two basic parameters—‘static’ criteria such as design, cost, marketing and ‘dynamic’ criteria like acceleration, manoeuvrability and endurance of the vehicle.

The championship was organised by Atelier Motors and according to a statement on its website, "the competition focused to expose and enhance engineering approach and practice for graduating students of engineering, tailored towards automotive industry.”