A team of six transition year students from Holy Rosary College Mountbellew have qualified for the F1 in Schools national finals 2021.
The Mountbellew team are Odie Melia (team manager and design engineer ), Cormac Delaney (manufacturing engineer ), Emma Kinane (graphic designer ), Róisín Corcoran (sponsorship and marketing manager ), Daragh Finn (resource manager ), and Amy Higgins (media and communications manager ).
Our team has a great combination of very dynamic, creative, enthusiastic, and enterprising personalities who are all very driven and determined to succeed in this competition. We are mentored and guided through the whole process by our inspirational teacher, Mr Kilkenny.
We decided to name our team Team REVolution as our aim is to be revolutionary in the world of F1 and compete as a team that is forward thinking, futuristic, and original. The use of capitals for the first three letters of REVolution creates a clever play on words that references the 'revving' of a car."
F1 in Schools is an international competition where students from schools from all over the world form their own Formula 1 team. Each team is made up of four to six students who are given the task of designing, testing, manufacturing, and eventually racing their own scaled F1 car. Teams must also gather sponsorship and fundraise to pay for any expenses such as manufacturing and testing.
The competition progresses through many different stages. Primarily, each team in Ireland was asked to create a five-page plan. Then each team's plan was assessed and judged against a range of criteria in order to qualify for the F1 in Schools national finals. We are proud to say we qualified for the Irish national finals which will be held virtually from April 19 to 23 this year. We will be competing against approximately 98 other Irish Secondary schools' finalists.
National finals involve the creation of both an enterprise and an engineering portfolio. The competition is not solely based on speeds achieved in the racing element, but also on the aerodynamics of the design, the strength, the aesthetics, the durability, and the various safety features incorporated into the design of the car. The business and marketing element also plays an essential role.
We wish to engage with the public and keep them updated with our progress throughout the competition and share our experiences for the duration of our involvement in this amazing competition. We hope that by sharing our experience and success to date in this competition, it will help inform and encourage more Irish schools to get involved and compete in the years ahead.
For the team, this Formula 1 in Schools competition has been an opportunity of a lifetime. We have enjoyed every second of our involvement in it. Before this competition our team members did not know each other very well, but now we are the best of friends which demonstrates the value of teamwork.
Covid-19 may have changed the way the competition is run this year, including moving the venue of this year's competition to an online virtual forum, but we are taking the positives from this. The project has helped us embrace new technologies and has in fact enhanced our enthusiasm and motivation to succeed as we have much more time to focus on the finer details as may not be the case in normal times. We hope to be one of the lucky four teams to reach the F1 in Schools world finals in Singapore.
We would like to say a massive thank you to our school. They have offered us so much support and encouragement as we have progressed along our F1 in Schools journey. We would like to say a massive thank you to Mr Kilkenny who has been our guide along this project, he checks in with us regularly, directs us to where resources are available for research, etc, and answers any questions we may have.
We are also very grateful to F1 in Schools Ireland. The organisers of the competition are very helpful. They host webinars occasionally, where you can ask questions which they will answer comprehensively. They also provide webinars for specific aspects of the competition, eg, a manufacturing webinar. These are very helpful as they give us a better idea of the overall standards and detail expected in each area of the project in order to progress and it makes it easier for us as a team to achieve our goals.
Our last thank you goes out to our amazing sponsors. Without them, we could not be where we are today.
Platinum sponsors: RBK and St Jarlath's Credit Union.
Gold sponsor: Finish Sheds.
Silver sponsors: Computex, TK Lighting.
Bronze sponsors: Riteway Engineering Ltd, CormacTagging.ie, O’Haras of Foxford, and Pallas Karting.
You can find the team on Instagram (teamrevolution.2021 ), Facebook (teamrevolution2021 ), TikTok (teamrevolution2021 ), Twitter (Team_Rev_ ), Snapchat (teamrevolution3 ), and on the website revolutionhrc.com
