Indy Autonomous Challenge Sets Autonomous Speed Record at Monza

Team PoliMOVE won the first-ever Indy Autonomous Challenge (IAC) road course time trial competition held at the Autodromo Nazionale Monza, setting an autonomous speed record in the process, event officials announced.

“Once again, the Indy Autonomous Challenge is pushing the boundaries of high-speed automation with a historic time trial race on the iconic Monza F1 circuit,” said Paul Mitchell president, IAC. “It was an honor for the IAC to have our competition approved by the Automobile Club d’Italia (ACI Sport) and watch the fans cheer on the winning hometown team PoliMOVE. We can’t wait to come back next year and attempt some head-to-head racing.”

The IAC brought six autonomous racecars and five university teams to MIMO to compete in six sessions over three days, totaling more than 1,300 miles of testing, organizers said. The autonomous driving software was programmed by students and researchers from universities and research centers from around the world, and included teams from:

• KAIST (Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology)
• MIT-PITT-RW (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Pittsburgh, Rochester Institute of Technology, University of Waterloo)
• PoliMOVE (Politecnico di Milano, University of Alabama)
• TII UNIMORE Racing (University of Modena and Reggio Emilia)
• TUM Autonomous Motorsport (Technische Universität München)

TII UNIMORE Racing, TUM Autonomous Motorsport, and PoliMOVE entered the final round of competition on Sunday afternoon separated by only three seconds.

Team PoliMOVE finished its final lap in 2:05.87 on the 5.79 kilometer / 3.6-mile-long track, with 11 turns, reaching a top speed of 273.4 KPH / 169.8 MPH.

TUM Autonomous Motorsport took second place with a lap time of 2:08.66 (269.9 KPH/167.7 MPH top speed) and TII UNIMORE Racing finished third with a final lap time of 2:11.24 (250.8 KPH / 155.8 MPH top speed). More than 10,000 spectators filled the stands to watch the fully autonomous racecars compete on the F1 circuit, organizers said.