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U.S. and British Firms Share SEMA Motorsports Engineering Award

19 November 1998

U.S. and British Firms Share Prestigious SEMA Motorsports Engineering Award

    WARRENDALE, Pa., Nov. 18 -- Lear Corporation of
Southfield, Michigan, and Stewart Grand Prix of Bucks, England, have won the
1998 SEMA Motorsports Engineering Award for the Lear Formula 1 Extractable
Seat System that provides quick and safe removal of a driver after an on-track
accident.
    Presented by the Specialty Equipment Market Association (SEMA) the award
was given for the outstanding contribution to state-of-the-art motorsports
engineering between December 1996 to October 1998.  The recipient is selected
by an invited group of motorsports members including Dan Rivard, Ford Motor
Company (ret.); Paul W. Haney, TV Motorsports; Wiley R. McCoy, McLaren
Engines, Inc.; Geoff Goddard, TWR Ltd.; John Pierce, Kestrel Advisors Inc.;
Michael J. Royce, Chrysler Corporation; J. Kirk Russell, CART Inc.; and Terry
Satchell, Andry Petree Racing Inc.
    The award will be presented at the Motorsports Engineering Conference
banquet November 18 in the Dearborn Room of the Hyatt Regency in Dearborn,
Michigan.  Daniel Jannette, president of Lear Corporation's Technology
Division and Neil Ressler, vice president of Advanced Vehicle Technology, Ford
Motor Company and a member of the Stewart Grand Prix Board will accept the
award from Charles Blum, president, SEMA.
    Prior to the development of this new seat, there was no proven, tested,
extractable seat for any race drivers.  The extractable seat saves time and
can eliminate post-shunt trauma caused by manual extrication of the driver
after a track accident.
    Lear worked with the Federation Internationale de L'Automobile (FIA)
Medical Commission, Technical Working Group and Stewart Grand Prix to develop
and implement the design.  The Lear Motorsports Team directed each step of
product development and was on site in Belgium and Austria during track
testing by the FIA's safety and the medical crews.
    The Motorsports Engineering Conference is a biennial event
organized by the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) that focuses on all
forms of professional motorsports engineering technology for open-wheel,
sports car, sedan, stock car, drag racing, rally, and motorcycle competitions.
For further information contact SAE at 724-772-7131, e-mail meetings@sae.org
or visit the SAE website at http://www.sae.org.

    SAE is a non-profit educational and scientific organization dedicated to
the advancement of mobility technology to better serve humanity.  More than
74,000 engineers and scientists who are SAE members develop technical
information on all forms of self-propelled vehicles including automobiles,
trucks and buses, off-highway equipment, aircraft, aerospace vehicles, marine,
rail, and transit systems.  SAE disseminates this information through its
meetings, books, technical papers, magazines, standards, reports, continuing
education programs, and electronic databases.