Submitted By: Forty-Niner ROP

The Green Grizzly Machine was awarded First Place in the Urban Concept/Alternative Fuel category at the Shell Eco Marathon Americas 2014 in Houston on Sunday, April 27. At the evening awards ceremony, Shell awarded Team Granite Bay individual medals, a trophy and a check for $2,000!

This was an incredible achievement for a rookie high school team! The Granite Bay Team competed against 92 teams from the US, Canada and Latin America, most of them from university engineering departments with years of experience and generous budgets. Some teams had been building their cars for over 2 years.

The event was held at the George R. Brown Convention Center and surrounding park and streets. Inside, the convention center was transformed into a giant auto shop – the “paddock” – where each school was provided a booth, banner and 24/7 power.

The weekend was full of challenges for Team Granite Bay. Just before leaving for Houston, the electrical control unit burned out and the car would not start. A new ECU had to be quickly located and express-shipped to the team in Houston on Thursday. Sean Nogrady, Matt Moeller and Austin Brown went to work installing it, and preparing the car for Technical Inspection the next day. The students rose to the occasion, problem-solved and were able to get the ready for the race and placed first in the Urban Concept/Alternative Fuel category.

What a great partnership between 49er ROP, Granite Bay High School and Shell!