UA Baja Racing Team Competition Campaign

Bama Racing is a part of the Society of Automotive Engineers' Mini Baja racing series. This competition requires grit. The overall premise is each team is limited to a 10-horsepower engine and must design a vehicle that can excel in mobility, power and acceleration; beat tough off-road courses; and go the farthest in the main event: a 4-hour endurance race designed to test even the strongest designs. It mimics the Baja 1000 race, although conditions vary with competition location each year.  

Bama Racing competes on a yearly basis. Throughout the semester students design, build, and test the car, and in mid-May, we travel to compete against teams from around the world. 

In the 2022 competition, we placed 37th out of 93 teams. Although we are proud of our accomplishments, we plan to score much higher in the coming years. Our team is up-and-coming. Although the team has existed for years, we only recently started competing yearly and modernizing our designs and production methods.

We seek to make both our team more competitive and to enrich our members. Our current focus is training members on computer-aided production methods, such as CNC mills and lathes, water jet cutting - and plasma jet cutting. Our team designed custom uprights three years ago to optimize steering and suspension capabilities, now, it is a yearly process. We’ve also entered the realm of custom machinery and tools. A key part of our car is the frame, which we fabricate ourselves. In the past, we had been improperly notching tubes because we didn’t have the proper tools. This led to high error in fabrication and increased difficulty. As a result, we designed a tool- superior and cheaper than other options on the market- to properly notch tubes and to have experienced a vast increase in precision. 

Any donation will help our team greatly. Our primary costs year-to-year are materials and purchased parts. As we look to modernize the materials we use and increase the complexity of our designs, this cost will only increase. Our second main cost is tools and equipment. We plan to design more custom tools in the future, and we will need to acquire new tooling for existing machines, and we will have a variety of other consumables that we need on a regular basis. Aside from direct needs, we also want to expand our advertising and media presence- to make our team more visible while being more professional.                              

In my years of experience in competitive sports and teams, I have not met a group as passionate as Bama Racing. We hope you will consider donating.

Your gift is tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law. If you received goods/services in return for your contributions, the value of the goods/services was deducted from the total amount of your gift. Your tax deduction is limited to the amount which your gift exceeds the value of the good/services.