Bangladesh Team Primus win Spirit of Formula Student Award

Team Primus from Ahsanullah University of Science and Technology from Bangladesh were the worthy winners of the RACE TECH Spirit of Formula Student Award on Saturday.

The team epitomises the spirit of the award, which is given to the team that encapsulates the story of blood, sweat and tears behind the Formula Student team’s journey.

Team Primus overcame huge barriers to become the country’s first Formula Student team.

As first year students the team early on realised their dream to be the first Bangladesh team to compete at Formula Student. As they lacked guidance and experience they realised first challenges was in the form of the engine.

With Bangladesh only giving road permits to motorcycle engines of up to 165cc the team’s target in 2017 was initially to import an engine of 600-700cc. However, after the authority’s refused the team mounted a legal challenge having to produce documents and paperwork to fight their case. After an agonising nine months, permission was finally granted and the team made history after Bangladesh for the first time granted permission to import higher cc engines to its borders.

The team funded themselves after failing to secure sponsorship and took online courses in automotive theories and modern F1 technology,  putting all their time and resource into building the car, even while fasting during Ramadan.

After negotiating a reduction of the extortionate tax and import charges they had to contend with, the team finally managed to get their Visa to come to the UK for Formula Student.

The team said: “We manufactured the whole car with our own means and not only did we import and bought every component we also designed and fabricated everything with our own hands. We lacked proper guideline of how to get things done which made our journey even more interesting. It has been an unbelievable adventure for the members of this team thus fur. “Team Primus”, the first ever FSUK team from Bangladesh in the history of Formula Student UK. This is like a dream come true for the members of the team to have achieved such a milestone.”

RACE TECH, Managing Director, Adrian Goodsell said: “Despite the huge practical, financial and political challenges, Team Primus never gave up on their dream to compete at Formula Student UK and is why they are the worthy winners of the RACE TECH Spirit of Formula Student Award.”