A large audience and a panel of experts at Gravitational Waves event.

A student wearing safety goggles and a work jacket uses an angle grinder on a piece of metal, sending spars across a workshop bench.
Two students work in a dim car shop—one in the front using an angle grinder, while the other is in the background in blue lighting.
A student in a red welding helmet and leather gloves welds on a table.
Five students huddle around their race car in the garage.
Two students inspect the body of the race car, with sponsor titles printed on it.
A student in a Terps Racing EV polo looks at a laptop while standing next to the race car.
Two hands hold the steering wheel of the car above the cockpit, with a digital display and wiring in the background.
A student in a Terps Racing EV polo adjusts components on the car.
A helmeted driver sits in the car while a student beside him looks at a laptop. Other students are gathered by a red pickup truck in the background.
Two students inspect their car, which sits among traffic cones in a parking lot.
Close-up of the headrest of the car, which has the team's logo embroidered in it.
Close-up of a student's jersey with the Terps Racing Electric Vehicle logo.
Students secure the race car in the back of a red pickup truck.

The Future of Terps Racing is Electric

/ 9 June 2026 /

Meet the Science Terps leading UMD’s newest racing team.

Most pedestrians wouldn’t bat an eye at the University of Maryland’s Cypress Building. With tinted windows and unassuming red awnings, you could easily mistake the off-campus building for the CVS Pharmacy across Baltimore Avenue. But inside, there’s a lightning-fast race car—and it’s powered solely by electricity. The vehicle is the product of a year’s work by the University of Maryland’s Terps Racing EV team. Each year, the team builds a vehicle to race in the Formula SAE Electric competition, held in June at the Michigan International Speedway.

A black racecar with the text "University of Maryland" moves along a blurry background of a blue, cloudy sky and green trees.
Terps Racing EV is preparing for the Formula SAE Electric competition, held in June at the Michigan International Speedway. Credit: Mark Sherwood

On a mild, sunny May afternoon, a crew of seven students loaded the car in the bed of a pickup truck and drove it a mile and a half to an empty campus parking lot behind Tawes Hall. They came equipped with a toolbox, traffic cones to set up a course and—for the worst-case scenario—a fire extinguisher. One student donned a racing suit, flipped the “Ready to Drive” switch, and launched down the track. The team was testing a new feature that would help them accelerate across the 75-meter course as fast as possible. The buzz of the electric motor whizzed through the air on an otherwise quiet summer campus. 

As the car raced around the makeshift course, the team’s high-voltage and software lead, Ali Niazi (B.S. ’26, computer science), gazed at his computer screen. Inspired by the automotive industry, which is increasingly designing more software-driven vehicles, he and his teammates recently developed a new dashboard that can control the car remotely. It also displays real-time data on the vehicle’s speed, battery performance, brake temperature, tire health and more. This bespoke system—most of which was developed this year—is critical for fine-tuning the car to squeeze out every ounce of performance possible, said Niazi, who will soon begin a full-time job as a software development engineer at Tesla. 

“We have the most amount of data we’ve ever had,” Niazi said. “We have more control over everything.” 

Now, they’re pushing the car’s systems to the limits in the weeks before the competition. 

“We’re trying to abuse the car and see what breaks so it won’t during competition,” Niazi added. “If it does shut down, we know instantly what the issue was. In past years, we had to plug into our software manually and probe many points across the wiring harness with a multimeter until we figured out what was wrong. The dashboard helps us do rapid tuning, debugging and iteration all at the trackside."

Niazi hopes the new capabilities will help the team build on a previous milestone performance: Last year, the racing team successfully built and raced a rules-compliant car for the first time. Despite hiccups in their vehicle’s waterproofing, they finished in the middle of the pack.  This year’s car is much improved: It can reach 76 miles per hour and accelerate from a standstill to 60 miles per hour in under 3.5 seconds. 

“We weren’t able to compete in all the events last year, but we got to compete, which is a great milestone,” said Jeff Vedrin (B.S. ’26, aerospace engineering), president of Terps Racing EV. “We’ve done everything in our power to try to get rid of all those issues from last year. Now, we’ve gotten all that ironed out.”

Two young men wearing polos point toward the inside of a black race car in a dimly lit garage.
Ali Niazi (left; B.S. ’26, computer science) and Jeff Vedrin (right; B.S. ’26, aerospace engineering) fine-tune the car ahead of the race. Credit: Mark Sherwood

New car on the block

Terps Racing EV is the newest of the three teams within Terps Racing—a student club with more than 100 members that was founded in 1982. For its first few decades, the club had two teams: Terps Racing IC, which builds a race car with an internal combustion engine, and Terps Racing Baja, which designs a Dune Buggy-style off-road vehicle. Terps Racing EV entered the fold in 2021.

Working on an electric vehicle comes with unique challenges. Aside from the battery cell, which the team buys, the students build the vehicle from scratch—including battery modules, aerodynamic components and the data management system Niazi pioneered. In addition to the mechanical and aerodynamic challenges that all three Terps Racing teams face, the EV team also must consider high voltage, battery heat, waterproofing and grounding. 

The hurdles were so significant that the team did not build an operational vehicle until 2024.

“I was the first driver ever to press the accelerator pedal on the car and make it move. That was crazy—to go from something that’s just on the computer that never worked in years prior, to being the person in the car with the fire suit on, with the helmet on, fully strapped in,” Vedrin recalled. “We were going five miles per hour, but that feeling—oh my god. There’s nothing that can compare to that.” 

Melding minds from across Maryland

Although many on the Terps Racing EV team are engineering students, 13% are computer science majors. Others are majoring in math, physics, music, government and politics, and more. The diverse array of students allows the team to take on tasks from designing the car and manufacturing its components to designing uniforms and securing sponsors. 

“We basically operate as a small Formula 1 team,” Vedrin explained. 

The team’s corporate support comes from major companies, including Tesla, General Dynamics and Texas Instruments. Additionally, they receive funding from the A. James Clark School of Engineering and the Student Government Association. 

Seven students stand behind a small black race car under a blue, cloudy sky.
Terps Racing EV team members come from across the university, including various majors from the College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences. Credit: Mark Sherwood

Diversifying their revenue will help them improve the car by taking on more complex projects in the coming years, Vedrin said. The most notable change for the next two years is upgrading from a single motor to a quad motor setup—one motor per wheel —which adds power and stability. For now, though, all eyes are on their current car, which they’ve been designing and manufacturing since last August. It’s nearly competition-ready, and 30 students will soon take it on a 500-mile journey to compete on the world stage in Michigan in June. 

Start your engines

The Formula SAE Electric competition includes a series of tests. The first unofficial challenge was simply registering. With only 100 available slots, there’s competition to get in. 

“Last year, it was like when Adidas did Yeezy drops,” Vedrin said, laughing, describing how team members spammed the registration portal as if they were purchasing limited-edition sneakers. “But this year it’s different—it’s a raffle, so you just have to hope you get chosen.”  

The team successfully secured a spot in the competition, which itself involves a series of static and dynamic events. This includes a technical inspection, a cost presentation and a brake test, where drivers bring the car to 30 miles per hour and then hit the brakes to lock up all four wheels. 

There’s also an acceleration test, where they take their car from a standstill to the fastest speed possible within 75 meters. The team has to find the smallest driver for that event, Vedrin explained, so the car has the least mass to accelerate. Additionally, there’s the skidpad, where they drive the car in figure eights, and a tilt test, where they bring the car up to 60° with somebody inside. That last one’s “a little scary,” Vedrin said.

Perhaps the toughest challenge is endurance, during which teams run their cars continuously for 44 kilometers. Some cars don’t make it the full distance. 

“Endurance is the main thing we spec the entire car for because it puts the most strain on it,” Vedrin explained. 

A person in a black racing suit and helmet sits inside a black race car with the words "University of Maryland" and various corporate sponsors, while a man holding a laptop speaks to him.
Ali Niazi (right; B.S. ’26, computer science) troubleshoots issues using a custom-built data management dashboard. Credit: Mark Sherwood

To find the best driver for the event, Terps Racing EV’s most dedicated members race go-karts at United Karting in Hanover, Maryland, and the top two drivers earn the right to sit behind the wheel in Michigan for the endurance event. 

“United Karting has real gas go-karts where you feel all the vibrations,” Vedrin said. “It’s really fun.” 

It’s that joy and camaraderie that Ethan Everitt (B.S. ’26, computer science) appreciates most about the team. He joined after transferring to UMD from Binghamton University. 

“As a transfer student, I wanted to find a community and be a part of a team,” he said. 

Additionally, Everitt wanted to learn hardware skills to complement his computer science curriculum. Last year, as the team’s data acquisition co-lead, he integrated sensors into the car and engineered new ways to store and visualize data. Now, as the team’s autonomous lead, he’s piloting camera systems that could one day allow the car to drive itself.

“It’s cool that I get to build a race car,” Everitt, a Formula 1 fan, explained, “but I also like that I’m able to put something real into the world that I can watch move—and to build something that I couldn’t on my own.” 

Reaping benefits beyond the track

Everitt doesn’t anticipate using his automotive skills in his career; he will soon start a full-time job in cybersecurity. But for other students, the employment benefits are substantial. 

Some team members have secured jobs with the team’s corporate sponsors. Others, such as Niazi, go on to work for automotive companies, including Tesla, Lucid, Rivian, Ford, Stellantis and GM.  

A select few even find employment with professional racing teams, such as Honda Motorsports. One of this year’s graduating team members—Ritwik Dobriyal (B.S. ’26, computer engineering)—will soon join General Motors Motorsports as a software engineer. His name even appears on the new Cadillac Formula 1 car. 

“That’s insane,” Vedrin said, gushing. 

It’s that passion for engineering and racing—and, for Vedrin, the grittiness of being an underdog—that is bringing this team to new heights. In just their second year with a rules-compliant car, they’re aiming to be elite. 

“We want to compete in and complete all the events,” Vedrin said. “The aim is to finish near the top.”

About the College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences

The College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences at the University of Maryland educates more than 10,000 future scientific leaders in its undergraduate and graduate programs each year. The college's 10 departments and seven interdisciplinary research centers foster scientific discovery with annual sponsored research funding exceeding $250 million.