The Speed & Custom Car Show is held annually at the Western Fair District Agriplex in London, Ontario. It attracts car enthusiasts from all over southwestern Ontario, featuring everything from antique vehicles and classics to dragsters and souped-up lawnmowers. Some of the highlights include live music and Crash a Van for Charity. Together with Western’s UWO Formula Racing Team, SunStang held a booth in the Agriplex for the weekend.

SunStang brought the 97 car, which many people recognized from not only our booth at WOMEX, but also from the Discovery Planet feature from so many years ago. We also brought along the 2005 car to show the steep progression in design that occurred over less than a decade. Finally, the tacked frame completed the bulk of the features of the booth.

Our pride and joy of the weekend, and the most popular highlight of our booth, was most definitely our race simulator! We built our own hardware to hook up to the racing software by Simraceway, complete with adjustable pedals and adjustable steering that was connected to the very steering wheel we will be using in this year’s solar car. This was set up in the cockpit of the 96 car, so the public can see what it’s like to race in an actual solar car. We had about 100 people try out our simulator this weekend, from small children to grown adults! They all raced the same car, a MG MK2, on 5 laps of Simraceway’s rendering of the NASCAR Martinsville track. We kept a record of each person’s fastest lap time and put them in a ranked list here, so everyone can see how they did. We even included the lap times of our own team drivers and other members so you can see how you compare against a SunStang driver! 

We were also featured in an issue of the Metro News, a local paper that was following the Car Show. You can read the article here, on page 30.

This weekend was a big success for SunStang, and we look forward to meeting more people and getting involved with the community as we make our way to Australia and back. 

-Ayeda