ABU DHABI //The UAE flag will be flying at one of the UK's biggest car festivals this weekend.
Pupils from the Al Hayer School for Basic and Secondary Education will compete against car design fanatics of all ages in the Bloodhound Challenge.
Their brief was to design a model car similar to the jet-powered, pencil-shaped Bloodhound SSC, which is still undergoing tests.
The Emirati students, Ammar Ahmed, 10, Ali Al Kaabi, 10, Alabbas Al Sultan, 10, and 11-year-old Abdul Rahman Al Ketbi will take their experience from the F1 in Schools competition last April to the competition in the Goodwood Festival of Speed from today to Sunday.
The boys live in Bedouin settlements in the desert and this will be their first foray out of the UAE.
The Bloodhound Challenge is similar to the F1 in Schools concept. But instead of working within a tight framework of the weight and size of the model car, they instead have to create a model car with optimised aerodynamics.
In this competition, the fastest car on the day takes home the trophy.
Last year's winner reached an average speed of 138kph over 0.62 seconds.
There are no restrictions on design or weight, and the cars are made from a standard block of balsa wood. They are powered by a compressed gas cartridge, and run along a straight track.
