YSU Baja Car Team places ninth in Baja SAE competition

Youngstown State University’s Penguin Baja Off-Road Racing team kicked off the 2023 Baja SAE competition season with two top 20 overall finishes and multiple top 10 event finishes.

The Baja SAE competition season comprises three events that take place from May to September. During the first two events in Oshkosh, Oregon and Washougal, Washington, the YSU team competed against 164 teams and finished ninth and 19th overall. The ninth place finish is YSU’s second top 10 overall finish in program history.

In individual events, the YSU team took second place in the Engineering Design Event at both competitions and a best ever eighth-place finish in the four-hour endurance race at the Oregon competition. The second place finish in engineering design is the best to date for YSU and ranks them as the top Baja design team in the United States, just behind a Canadian team.

Baja SAE challenges engineering students, from colleges and universities around the world, to design and build an off-road vehicle that will survive the severe punishment of rough terrain and in some competitions, water. Students work together as a team to discover and resolve technical challenges in design, test and manufacturing, as well as business issues. Each team is expected to design and build a prototype of an all-weather, rugged, single-seat, off-road recreational vehicle intended for sale to the nonprofessional weekend off-road enthusiast.

Graduating seniors include: Katie Chludzinski, Lisbon, Ohio; Reece Wilson, Ellwood City, Pennsylvania; John Gula, Cortland, Ohio; Ahmed Mousa, Warren, Ohio; Jesse Irons, Newton Falls, Ohio; Joshua Entrikin, Lisbon, Ohio; Colin Heinrich, Bentleyville, Pennsylvania; Landon Morucci, North Lima, Ohio; Jared Bryarly, Columbiana, Ohio; and Dante Flak, Canfield, Ohio.

The graduating team members are going to work for Honda, Parker Hannifin, Hunt Valve, Penske Automotive Nascar Racing and continuing their academic careers in YSU’s Mechanical Engineering Graduate Program.

The third 2023 competition will take place in September in Nashport, Ohio where the incoming seniors will take the wheel.