Today’s news is filled with articles about driverless vehicles especially when one crashes. How appropriate that the Indianapolis Motor Speedway is contributing to making the autonomous vehicles safer.

The Indianapolis Motor Speedway can trace its roots back to a trip Carl Fisher made to England where he visited Brooklands, one of the first dedicated auto racing courses. Fisher had participated in many races including in Europe and was convinced that if the American automobile was not improved, the European autos would be a threat to the industry. A large racetrack would be a good place to test automobiles.

Fisher made several attempts to interest various Indianapolis business owners in building a racetrack. Finally in 1908 he convinced his Prest-O-Lite business partner, James Allison, and two friends Arthur Newby (president of National Motor Vehicle Company) and Frank Wheeler (president of Wheeler Schebler Carburetor Company), to join to with him. Land was purchased, the track was constructed and the first races were held in August 1909.

IMS returned to its roots when it hosted the Indy Autonomous Challenge in October 2021, a 20-lap race for autonomous (driverless) race cars. In the days before the 2019 Indianapolis 500, autonomous vehicle experts gathered at the Speedway and talked about having a race.

A Dallara IL-15, which is used in the Indy Lights series, was constructed without a cockpit. Instead of a driver, the racer was equipped with radar, lidar (which uses light to measure ranges) and optical cameras. Powered by an 350 horsepower internal combustion engine, the driverless cars raced for a $1 million prize to be awarded to the first team to cross the start/finish line under 25 minutes. Initially teams from 39 different colleges from 11 countries and four continents formed 30 race teams.

A group of students from the Department of Automotive Engineering at Clemson University worked with Dallara and Indianapolis based Energy Systems Network in the development of the car which included the sensors which would help the driverless cars to pull out of pit lane, avoid obstacles and gauge track conditions. Because of the pandemic, teams had to work remotely. When the Indy Autonomous Challenge race was held, there were 21 universities participating with nine teams. Nearly $120 million was invested by sponsors in the competition.

In July, the teams went to Lucas Oil Raceway, a nearby racing facility to test their cars. It showed that lots of work remained with the technology. The cars had difficulty in maintaining 30 miles per hour and struggled to have the car stop in the proper pit stop. Ultimately four teams competed in the official runs during the first round at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. EuroRacing with schools from Italy, Switzerland and Poland, was the fastest on the track with a speed of 131.148 miles per hour.

During the race, the teams didn’t have any communication with their cars beyond looking at data transmitted from the cars to determine if their software was functioning properly. In case of an accident, each car was equipped with a failsafe system which would shut the car down. The teams raced against the clock rather than against each other.

The start of the race featured a drone delivering a checkered flag to “Spot,” a robotic dog. The Indy Autonomous Challenge consisted of five rounds. In the first, the teams did a warmup lap, two timed laps and then a cool-down lap. On the cooldown lap, the cars had to navigate around several inflatable barriers on the track’s front stretch. Only four teams competed in the final round consisting of four warm-up laps and two-timed laps.

PoliMOVE (Politecnico di Milano and the University of Alabama) went 157 mph around the track before a computer malfunction sent the car into the wall at the end of turn one. EuroRacing had a lap of 139.009 mph but a programing error had the car running five rather than six laps which knocked it out of the competition. The competition was won by TUM Autonomous Motorsport, a German team, with an average run of 135.944 mph capturing the $1 million prize.

The autonomous racers participated in a head-to-head competition at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway in January 2022. Five teams, representing seven universities competed to win the $150,000 grand prize. The start of the race was led by Halo, a remote-piloted driverless car as the pace car. The warm of lap had speeds of 65 to 80 mph before the start of each round. PoliMOVE set the fastest speed record on an oval with a top speed of 173 mph and won the competition.

In April, the PoliMOVE team set a world record for an autonomous racecar with a speed of 192.2 mph over 1000 meters (0.62 miles) at the Kennedy Space Center. The racer had an upgrade engine package which could deliver 30% more horsepower than previous models.

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