CTU Lions student motorcycles won four medals at the Moto GP circuit in Barcelona - News service

Publication date:

2019/11/19

The CTU Lions racing mototeam of CTU students brings two silver and two bronze medals from the world-famous Barcelona-Catalunya circuit. From Friday 15th to Sunday 17th November races were held under the auspices of Catalonia Road Motorcycle Championship and our CTU Lions representatives competed with both electric and internal combustion engine of their own design.

There were three training rides for each bike on the first day. Thanks to them, the team managed to fine-tune the latest shortcomings and the student motorcycles were then able to pass the mandatory scrutiny the following day, which for example involved checking the functionality of the electrical system and especially the emergency shutdown for the electrical system.

On Sunday morning, the racers left a quick warm-up on cold asphalt, which proved to be the first cleansing among all starting motorcycles. The combustion engine motorcycle started from the grid in both main races, while with the electric motorcycle the students saved the battery and omitted the initial approach laps and started directly from the pitline. They were able to use the saved energy in actual laps. Their competitors were not successful, some bikes did not start at all and others did not finish the race for various reasons, mainly due to crashes and engine failures. CTU students finished in both races with the internal combustion engine on the third and the electric motorcycle in the second place.

Within the project led by the Faculty of Transportation Technology of the Czech Technical University in Prague, the only czech university that participates in the MOTOSTUDENT international student competition. The aim of the two-year project is the design, development, construction and subsequent weekly competition with a motorcycle of its own design. CTU Lions team was established at the Faculty of Transportation Technology under the guidance of doc. Petr Bouchner and Ing. Jiří First in 2014 and in 2016 it took part in the combustion engine race for the first time. In the following years, both combustion and electric motorcycles have been involved in the races.