LONGHORN RACING
THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN
Our Combustion Leads
Kellen Cao
Team Captain
Kellen is a third year Electrical Computer Engineering Major and also the Team Captain of Longhorn Racing Combustion. Before becoming captain, he was mainly involved in powertrain and electronic work, and he loves to interact with all forms of automotive engineering. You can pretty much always find him somewhere in the ETC, and very occasionally in the classes that he paid money to attend. This team has built his skill set and passion for learning, and he is honored to get the chance to involve more people into it. Feel free to reach out to him at any time!
Ehsan Kapadia
Operations Lead
Ehsan is a second-year BHP/Finance/Math student. As Operations lead, he intimidates the rest of the team and manages things like treasury, corporate relations and public relations. His fun fact is that he pours milk before cereal, which was the incorrect answer.
Tanu Gadiyar
Dynamics Lead
Tanu (like canoe with a T) is a second year Mechanical Engineer and the Dynamics lead on combustion from Katy, Texas. When he's not doing LHR, he's either 3D printing for other people or having nightmares about control arms. You'll usually find him at the ETC not taking care of his responsibilities, so come talk to him about about tires, suspension, or anything else that moves on the car (no guarantee it'll make sense). Fun fact, his arms are 5x thicker than control arms!
Maximo Torres
Chief Engineer
Max is a fourth-year Aerospace Engineering student from Dallas, Texas. As Chief Engineer, his responsibilities include managing the high-level design and manufacturing goals and ensuring good systems integration throughout the team. His greatest challenge of this year is trying to explain what powertrain does to the Dynamics lead. In between working, he spends his time thinking about the takeoff speed of the car if the wings were flipped and dreams of getting an ISO 9001 certification. Oh and if you need a 1972 Honda CB125 engine, he's got one of those too.
Nigel Ling
Manufacturing Lead
Nigel is a fourth year Aerospace Engineering student from Houston, Texas. As the Manufacturing Lead, he is in charge of overseeing all manufacturing operations on the Combustion Team. He might like machines more than humans. He said he would come up with something else to put here later, but he’s too busy trying not to fail mechanics of solids for a third time.
Ameya Dhumal
Powertrain Lead
Ameya (Amey-mey), is a second year Mechanical Engineering from Folsom, California and this season’s Powertrain Lead. When he is not falling off his skateboard, he specialize in making joker quotes. Bulbous and proportionate, you never know whether you are talking to him or his 27 other personalities. Don’t ask Amey-mey when he was last in the gym, it’s a sensitive topic.
Wesley Barefoot
Composites Lead
Wesley is a third year Mechanical Engineering student from Rual North Texas. As the Composites System Lead he is in charge of the team that not only is manufacturing and designing the Composite components for the car, but also leading the Composite Research for the team as we strives to reduce the weight of the car through new materials. He is curently designing a new Composite chassis that can be used between both the Combustion and Eletric Teams. He sends most of his time misspeling things as well as wandering why he is still manufacturing parts at 5 am, and how to insure that he doesn't have to repeat classes.
Francisco Fabregat
Electronics Lead
Francisco Jose Fabregat Garcia is a fourth year electric and computeer engineer (wannabe cs major). He spends most of his time driving his black S class mercedes with the F.Fabre license plate. When he is not drinking Diet Coke, he can often be seen screaming when he shorts his own boards. Fun fact: he has the coolest job: he waves flags at fast cars and occasionally bribes his sub system lead with pictures of Ferraris to get her to do her job.
Gautam Vachaspati
Body Lead
Gautam is a third year Mechanical Engineering student from Keller, Texas. He is the Body lead for Combustion, which includes Brakes, Ergo, and Frame.
Tejas Maraliga
Simulation and Validation Lead
Tejas is a fourth year Chemical Engineering student from Boston, MA. When he's not thinking about how he can't get a ChemE job, he loves drinking coffee, thinking about switching majors, and writing endless lines of code for whichever lead asks.
John Zhang
Aerodynamics Lead
John is a fourth year Mechanical Engineering student from Qingdao, China. Yes, he is a MechE doing aerodynamics. As the lead of the team's favorite system, he strives to create the most unsophisticated, easy-to-install aerodynamic package the team has ever seen. In fact, some say that he is so hard working, you will not even see him for the first semester of the season.