In a building on Ligon Street lies Wolfpack Motorsports, a club that has quietly but consistently been one of the strongest and most active clubs at N.C. State.
As a club dedicated to all motorsports enthusiasts, it has also helped students find work. According to Wolfpack Motorsports, many graduates who are involved in the club have found jobs in the auto-racing industry for teams such as Hendrick Motorsports, Richard Childress Racing, and Penske Racing. In addition, many graduates find employment with companies in the automotive engineering industry, such as Volvo Trucks, Bosch and Honda Motor Company.
Justin Howell, the club captain and a senior in mechanical engineering, thinks the club is an amazing way to get practical experience for people interested in cars and engineering. Howell is in his fifth year with the club and in his second year of captaincy.
"It's a blast; we get to build a race car and race it," Howell said. "It's nice, because you actually put into practice what you learn in the classroom and get a lot of hands-on experience, whereas most people in mechanical engineering don't have [the] hands-on experience that we get from this."
The College of Engineering, department of mechanical engineering and the University itself have been very supportive of the club, a fact Howell is quick to admit. He also pointed out the importance of the alumni to the club.
"The school and department gives us some money through SG [student government] E-council, but otherwise it's companies we know that have given us money in the past," Howell said. "We just go out to anybody we can and try to get money. A lot of it comes from the alumni, who previously did it and know how much it takes so when they go out and make big bucks, they can donate money so that's a big part. When I graduate and have a job, I know I'll donate some money."
David Bohle, a sophomore in mechanical engineering, feels that joining this club helps him put things in perspective while helping him to decide if engineering is what he really wants to do.
"As a freshmen coming in, I didn't know what I wanted to do yet," Bohle said. "I knew [I wanted to do] something related to mechanical engineering, then I heard about Wolfpack Motorsports. I didn't have a huge interest in cars, but I like building stuff. It turns out this club really helps you and it takes what you learn in class and applies it to real life. There are so many examples where I can say, ‘This is what I learnt, and now I am applying it in motorsports,' so that helps a whole lot."
Apart from motorsports, the club has also been involved in other activities.
"We did a lot of volunteer work out in Missouri after the tornadoes came," Bohle said. "14 members were out there for 4 days to help clean up the place, and helped [to] rebuild a church."
In his fourth semester with Wolfpack Motorsports, Nathan Brace, a junior in mechanical engineering, admits that it came down to suitability and seniority when deciding who got to drive the car in the race.
"We usually do it [deciding who gets to drive] by seniority, [the] people who have been here the longest," Brace said. "[For] certain events like acceleration, you want the lightest person on the car; for tractor pull, you want the heaviest person possible."
Brace also discussed how everything, including the training, is done in-house and how one batch of students inherits the knowledge from the previous batch.
"We teach ourselves how to do a lot of it [how to engineer cars]," Brace said. "Everybody kind of teaches the next generation that comes along, so we just keep on amassing knowledge over time. We had a couple of students come who were just really good at what they did, and they helped us get better as a team."
Wolfpack Motorsports meets every Thursday at 7 p.m. at MAE West Annex Building Lab Room 121, 3217 Ligon Street, Raleigh 27695. You can also reach them at contact@wolfpackmotorsports.com
ALT:
Baja- Off-road buggy
Formula team- open wheel race car like Formula 1
SAE- Society of Automotive Engineers
$50,000- Amount required to build one car.
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