Accelerating from the engine room

On the face of it, the two cars couldn’t look much different: one long and low, with a single-person cockpit and the fins, wings and flaps that mark it out as belonging to the Formula One (F1) grid; the other short, snub-nosed and with two seats enclosed in a simple cabin. Their uses are also markedly different, from zooming around circuits in front of cheering crowds to bimbling around the centre of crowded cities at a leisurely pace. What they have in common is that both use internal combustion engines that were designed specifically for them and for the particular kind of journey they will make; designed, moreover, to convert as much of the potential chemical energy of their fuel into the kinetic energy of the car and, in both cases, by teams steeped in the disciplines of motorsport. How the teams behind these two engines went about their task, and the different solutions they found, makes for a fascinating contrast.