Image: Abigail Bassett
When you think of the Cannonball Run, you probably think of a group of people making the trip from New York’s Red Ball Garage to the Portofino Hotel in Redondo Beach in the shortest (and usually most dangerous) amount of time. Police encounters, lack of sleep, zero rest stops, a spare fuel tank or two, and gallons of energy drinks are usually what fuels these attempts to make the roughly 3,000-mile route in record time.
But something was lacking in the most recent successful attempt: conventional gasoline. That’s because speed wasn’t the aim of the three friends who built and drove a solar-powered car across the country in a record-setting 13 days, 15 hours, and 19 minutes.
While that’s more than 300 hours longer than the 25-hour…
