Team Schluckspecht Qualifies for the World Cup in Qatar with the S8

Team photo with arms raised in celebration, the victory pose, and the vehicles

With this result, the team has qualified for the Shell Eco-marathon Global Championship for the first time since 2023 with its new battery-electric prototype. The championship will be held from January 21 to 25, 2027, at the Lusail International Circuit in Doha, Qatar.

On Sunday morning, the sixth and final qualifying runs with the S8 and S5, held in extreme temperatures of 38 degrees Celsius, did not yield any further improvements. This made the anticipation leading up to the awards ceremony all the greater. For the first time, the three best runs (weighted by a conversion factor) were combined with bonus points from the Off-Track Awards—and compared against all other teams across all categories—to determine the winners.

And then came the surprise: The new university record of 736 kilometers per kilowatt-hour (previously 684 km/kWh) achieved in the very first of a total of six scoring runs—along with five additional competition runs at a similar level and winning the Safety Award—was enough to qualify the S8, along with only six other teams out of a total of 135, for the World Championship in Qatar. And the placings in the efficiency competition alone are impressive: 5th place for the Urban Concept S5 and 9th place for the new Prototype S8 in a very strong field of competitors.

So now we’re off to Qatar in 2027. “The team is thrilled to be heading to the World Championship once again after India in 2023,” explained Team Leader Prof. Claus Fleig. However, of the 30 people who participated in the Shell Eco-marathon Europe & Africa, only 15 will be able to make the trip. A difficult decision lies ahead, but this fantastic team—from the mechanics and electrical engineers to the media staff and even the chefs—will surely rise to the challenge in the spirit of success. Despite the very satisfactory results with the S8, the team members are already brimming with new ideas to break the 1,000-kilometer mark on a single kilowatt-hour in the coming years. The S5 will compete once again in the Shell Eco-marathon Europe & Africa in 2027, but the focus is already on developing its successor, the S7.