For the purpose of this event, the students are to assume they have been hired by a manufacturing firm to design and build a prototype car for evaluation as a production item. This firm requires the car to be manufactured for under $9000 at a rate of 1000 cars per year, resulting in a detailed cost analysis of every component on the vehicle. The car must have very high performance in terms of acceleration, braking, and handling characteristics but also be low in cost, easy to maintain, reliable, and safe. Each collegiate team is required to present the car to the judges as if they were selling the car to the manufacturer. The cars are judged in several categories: static inspection and engineering design, solo performance trials, high performance track endurance, cost, and team presentation. In each event the manufacturing firm has specified minimum acceptable standards that are reflected in scoring equations.      The cars brought to the competition may all be roughly the same size and type, but each car is as different from the next as your fingerprint is from your co-workers. A sportbike motorcycle engine no larger than 610 cubic centimeters powers most cars. These engines are required to be of the four-cycle class but are harnessed by a wide variety of intake, exhaust, and fuel systems. Suspension systems on most winning cars are variant models of that seen on modern Formula One machines. Frame design varies from innovative configurations of alloy steels and aluminum tube to custom one-piece composite forms. It is these systems and many others that provide the arena for the creativity of the aspiring engineer to come to life.