Momentum - September 2019 - 5

STUDENT
GENERATION

The Graz Technical University team's car is shown here competing
in the Endurance Event at FSAE Michigan, which it won en route to
second place overall.
or all of the SAE and European competitions. "Formula
Student" is a term used in this article to refer generically
to the competitions on both continents.
Asked how meaningful it was to have led his team
to victory at FSAE Michigan, Stuttgart's Head of Engineering, Christian Lichtenberg, told MOMENTUM, "I
don't see this first place as a personal achievement; it
was only possible with the help of the whole team and
the special commitment of some individuals. For me
personally, it is a great ending of my two-and-a-halfyear Formula Student career, and looking back to it, I
could not be more proud than I am right now."
Only 7 points separated Stuttgart and second-place
Graz at FSAE Michigan. Graz actually ended up with
more event wins (3) than Stuttgart (1) and fared better
in 3 of the 4 dynamic events. But Stuttgart's margin
of victory over Graz in its sole event win, Design, was
40 points.
"The Design Event is always one of the disciplines
we put the biggest focus on, and in my opinion it is
the most important event of the whole competition,"
Lichtenberg said. "Other than in the dynamic disciplines,
which are often associated with luck-e.g., track
conditions, weather-you can show your knowledge and
all of the thoughts which were made to design the car."
"Our design scores for the whole season (SAE and
European) are maybe one of the things I am most proud
of. We managed to win 4 out of 5 Formula Student
Design Events (2nd place at FS Austria) and made 745
out of 750 reachable points. The reason why we put our
focus on the Design Event is not only the 150 points you
can get at each competition, it is also directly connected
to the engineering and organizational solutions you
realized in your project, which means if you are good in
design, it is the best base on which to build a successful
racecar. I would call this a win-win situation."

MOMENTUM

Great engineering design gave the University of Stuttgart car a great base on which
to compete on the track. "We managed to not have the typical disagreements
between, for example, the suspension guys and the aerodynamicists, which resulted
in great components like our titanium flexure joints or oval a-arms," the team's Head
of Engineering, Christian Lichtenberg, told MOMENTUM. The car is shown coming out
of a straight on the FSAE Michigan Endurance course.
Graz team captain Stefan Jurecs noted that his team brought to
FSAE Michigan only about half the number (12) of team members that
Stuttgart did. In that light, "I'm pretty satisfied and I'm really proud to be
the team captain," he said.
MOMENTUM asked Jurecs which vehicle system was most important
in the team's great performance. "Well, a single vehicle system which
made the car that fast is not easy to determine," he responded. "So think
about when we would take, for example, our rear-wheel steering or our
engine or any other system and put it on a slow car. Would that system
make the car really fast? The answer is no. You have to see the car as an
engineering solution which can only be so dominant on track due to the

ETS team captain Alex Guerin poses next to the #5 just before start of the Design
Event at FSAE Michigan. ETS's cars "are always small, light, and agile, and I think that
this helps us in every aspect of the dynamics events," Guerin told MOMENTUM.

September 2019 5

Momentum - September 2019

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Momentum - September 2019