Acceleration
What is it??
- Acceleration is speeding up, slowing down, or changing direction.
- From the drop of the green flag, the cars have to accelerate as fast as they can.
- Acceleration = (Final Velocity - Initial Velocity)/Time
- What it means- Your speed is your velocity, (speed in a specific direction), at the finish line, minus your velocity when you began, divided by the time it took to go that distance.
- Example:
- Jeff Gordon is driving at 26.82 m/s (60 mph). The green flag drops and he drives away! In 10 seconds, he has reached 80.47 m/s (180 mph).
- To find his acceleration, I took his 26.82 m/s (initial velocity) and subtracted that from 80.47 m/s (final velocity) which I divided by 10 (Time). Therefore, his acceleration was 5.365 m/s squared..
- This is a graph of Jeff Gordon's acceleration.
Tips for the Team
- Have a good reaction time so that you can jump on the accelerator as soon as you can.
- Hold down the pedal so that you can reach you top speed before the rest.