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Drone Club prepares for new racing season, to host first race day

 

(Posted Sept. 26, 2019)

The Drone Club at APSU is ready to follow up its inaugural racing season in which the team’s top flyer qualified for the Collegiate Drone Racing Association national championships.

The club will host its first practice race at 4 p.m. Friday, Sept. 27, at Edith Pettus Park, 345 Farris Drive near the Clarksville campus. Anyone interested in drones and drone racing can come watch, including Austin Peay State University students interested in joining the club.

Attendees will have a chance to fly some of the slower drones and watch a race through racing goggles, getting the drone’s-eye view as it zips and dips through the course. 

“The big thing right now is trying to grow the University racing club but then also having invitationals out in the community and with other colleges,” said Michael Hunter, Drone Club president. “We’re trying to get people interested.”

Hunter represented Austin Peay in April when he qualified for the drone racing nationals at the University of North Dakota. He finished 22nd overall at the competition. 

The club’s racing season will start soon, as soon as the Collegiate Drone Racing Association releases its racetrack specifications.

Michael Hunter builds racing drone for nationals 

ABOUT THE CLUB

The Drone Club has monthly races and meetings and co-hosts events with other clubs (such as an event Sept. 20 with the GeoClub and design club AIGA). If you want to be a racer, dues are $25 each semester (to help cover the cost of drone crashes); if you just want to learn how to build and fly drones, dues are $20 for a full year.

The biggest benefit of joining the club is you gain access to all the tools need to build drones. 

“Instead of spending $1,000 to get the equipment you’ll need for the tools just to build one, pay the dues and you have access to all the equipment,” Hunter said. “If you are interested in something like this, and you need help, that’s what we’re here for is for you to come in, and we can teach you hands-on how to build your drone, how to fly them, how to race them.”

The Drone Club’s next meeting is 5 p.m. Friday, Oct. 4, in the Maynard Mathematics and Computer Science Building front lobby. The next open house and game night is 4 p.m. Friday, Oct. 18, in Maynard Room 244.

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