Electrathon America Comes To Homestead-Miami Raceway

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Last Updated on: 14th April 2025, 04:51 pm

Electrathon America is an organization that provides hands-on opportunities for participants to learn about STEM principles as they design and build an electric vehicle for competition. The race is not always won by the swiftest. In Electrathon competition, each contestant starts the race with a the same amount of electrical energy. The race lasts one hour and the winner is the car that has traveled the farthest when the checkered flag drops. That means efficiency is a priority, rather than top speed.

Florida Power and Light is an active supporter of Electrathon America in Florida. It supplies dozens of teams of high school students from around the state with starter kits consisting of the basic chassis, the motor, the motor controls, and running gear, including wheels and brakes. The students then design and build the bodywork for the cars, test their vehicles to determine their energy usage under various conditions, and plan how to get the most distance out of their cars at the next race.

On April 12, 2025, the latest Electrathon America event took place at Homestead-Miami Raceway as part of the Formula E race weekend. My wife and I were guests of Jaguar TCS Racing, one of eleven teams that participate in the Formula E series that brings all electric racing to venues around the world. As we were waiting for our introduction to the team, we wandered into the FPL area outside the grandstands were a dozen teams were busy preparing for their competition later that day.

What captured our attention was not the cars themselves but the sense of excitement rippling through each school’s team area. Students were working feverishly to prepare their entry, adjusting this, tweaking that, and generally having a wonderful time. This is a curriculum that excites students. No one was on their phone or stuck off in a corner playing video games. They were all engrossed in what they were doing and having the time of their lives while learning valuable lessons about science, technology, engineering, and math.

“You can learn about being a leader or a problem solver. You can learn about wiring or turning wrenches. You can learn about body paneling and graphic design, getting sponsorships,” Isabella Buckhardt, an associate project manager for FPL told Lake Okeechobee News earlier this year. “Building cars, racing them; I come from a long line of racing and building cars and ever since I can remember,” said Rhet Osterhoudt, a junior at Okeechobee High School. “I’ve been in and out of race cars and building them throughout my family.”

Electrathon America And Florida Power & Light

2025 is the third year FPL has supported students across the state as part of the Electrathon America initiative, providing materials and training to more than two dozen high schools from Miami to Pensacola. Electrathon America offers an exciting, hands-on opportunity for students to dive into engineering concepts by designing, building, and racing their own electric go-karts. The program aligns with FPL’s commitment to empowering the workforce of tomorrow with vital STEM skills and fostering future careers in the field.

Electrathon America is not restricted to bulked-up gym rats, and there were as many young women involved in the pre-race preparations as young men. This is an educational opportunity that not only focuses on STEM skills, it also teaches teamwork, cooperation, and sharing of ideas and strategies. It goes without saying that the teams seek out the lightest member of the team to drive the car.

Once the green flag waves, the race begins. Each car starts with a maximum of 1000 Watt-hours (1 kWh) of electrical energy. Lead acid batteries are used in the events sponsored by FPL because they are readily available and inexpensive. They also do not require a battery management system, which adds complexity and costs. Lithium-ion batteries are allowed in national Electrathon America events. The competition focuses on how efficiently each car and driver can travel with unpredictable traffic and a variable road course. One hour after the green flag, the checkered flag is waved and the car that traveled the farthest wins.

Electrathon America is partly funded through a modest membership fee of $30 for the first team vehicle, and $15 for each vehicle thereafter of the same team. Event entry fees range from free and up, averaging around $25 per car.  Costs vary widely because each team decides what parts and components to buy. Frame materials, system voltage, motor type, battery and so forth are up to the designers, although in Florida, FPL does supply the basics for each car. Typical vehicle costs from new parts will likely fall between $2000 (scratch built) and $5000 (a kit). Electrathon America says that building a car from used parts can save significantly on costs. It also has a resource manual with links to parts suppliers to assist teams that are just starting out.

The racing is just as intense as any motorsports event, even if the speeds are considerably slower. Reliability issues are often a big factor in the competition. Chains and sprockets tend to break or become misaligned. Electrical connections fail and batteries don’t always perform as expected. Nevertheless, the contestants remain undaunted and there are always opportunities for celebration and camaraderie when the competition is over. Contestants share their experiences and may pick up hints from other teams that will serve then well in future events. Here is a video of the Electrathon America sponsored by FPL event a year ago at Homestead-Miami Raceway.

The Electrathon America series is designed to appeal to young students of all ages. It encourages them to include science, technology, engineering, and mathematics in their lives and develop skills that will stand them in good stead for securing good paying jobs in the future. In addition to building an electric car for the competition, the team needs to figure out the complex mathematics required to travel the maximum distance possible with the limited amount of electrical energy available.

There is a tremendous desire to go as fast as possible from the start, but that will just leave you with a flat battery on the side of the track as other contestants who drive more judiciously catch up and pass. This is a real world application of the lessons we all learned in elementary school about the tortoise and the hare — life lessons that will endure long after the competition is finished.