Aussie student wins dream F1 placement

A 21-year-old student from Nundah, Queensland, will soon be following his Formula One dream to Britain.

As winner of the Asia-Oceania finals of this year's Infiniti Engineering Academy, Jaden Partridge, will spend six months with Renault Sport Formula One at its headquarters in Enstone (UK) and another six months at Infiniti's European Technical Centre in nearby Cranfield.

Partridge’s adventure starts next month (November 2016).

At the Infiniti-affiliated operations Jaden will play a role with the transfer of information and technical expertise between the two organisations.

A student at Queensland's University of Technology, Jaden beat nine other finalists in the regional finals held recently at Infiniti's global headquarters in Hong Kong.

The first-ever Australian winner, he now joins other finalists from six other regions (USA, Canada, Mexico, Europe, UAE and China) in claiming a year-long placement “thereby gaining industry experience most engineering students can only dream of”.

Infiniti describes its academy as a "unique automotive-to-motorsport training program for brilliant young engineers". Already attracting over 4100 entrants from 44 countries, a number of previous winners have gone on to secure careers in the automotive and motorsport fields.

In securing his winning place, Jaden underwent a rigorous two-day assessment conducted under the intense scrutiny of Infinity's and Renault Sport Racing's top executives and engineers.

The 21-year-old said he was elated to have secured a place on the program.

"Winning the Infiniti Engineering Academy is completely mind-blowing," he said.

"Competing here against nine other very capable candidates and then being the one selected is incredible and genuinely a massive surprise for me."

Tommaso Volpe, Global Director, Infiniti Motorsport, said the program delivered benefits on multiple levels.

"The extraordinary level of interest in this year's Infiniti Engineering Academy has been absolutely fantastic," he said.

"Students have seen the accomplishments of our Academy's graduates, who have gone on to forge successful careers in the automotive industry. This has meant that more students than ever want to use the Academy to gain vital engineering experience and launch their own careers.

"With F1 becoming more and more relevant to the automotive industry and an increased focus of the placements this year being on the road car development, we are training a new generation of engineers who will play a key role in the crossover between the two industries," he stated.

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