2 Waterloo Students at Indianapolis Motor Speedway for Self-Driving Race Car Challenge | The Canadian News

The University of Waterloo says two students will be part of a team chasing the $ 1 million jackpot at the Indy Autonomous Challenge on Saturday.

The school says Brian Mao and Ben Zhang are part of a team made up of students from four schools across the continent that helped develop a million-dollar autonomous race car hoping to reach speeds of up to 190 km / h in Indianapolis. . Motor Speedway.

“This is something that no one else has done before – bring autonomous vehicles to those kinds of speeds,” said Mao, 23, of Newmarket.

“There are many unsolved problems that need to be addressed.”

Waterloo says that 10 teams from 21 schools made up of students from nine countries have been working to prepare modified Dallara AV-21 race cars for this competition since 2019.

“The only control we have is an emergency button,” said Zhang, 24, of Vancouver.

The Waterloo couple have been in Indianapolis for about six weeks, adding the Waterloo software to the actual race car, which was also rebuilt by students from MIT, the University of Pittsburgh and the Rochester Institute of Technology.

“Honestly, it’s amazing to see him in person,” Mao said on the track.

“The track is so big that after the first corner we won’t even be able to see our car. We have to see it on multiple monitors. “

Waterloo initially had plans for its own race car, but eventually joined forces with the three American schools to pool resources.

The team’s race car was one of four that did not crash during a simulation in June.

“We are confident that it will run on the track at high speed,” said Zhang. “We have tried it several times. What we are still a bit unsure of is his maneuver to avoid obstacles. “

They had initially planned for the car to travel at speeds of up to 290 km / h, but safety concerns caused them to foil those plans.

“We are nervous and excited at the same time because we have spent a lot of time and we have worried a lot about this,” Mao said.

“We really want to make sure we don’t crash the car.”