The Clearroute Hackathon – driving competitive advantage

A 24-hour, global crash-free ‘course’ in creative coding.

It was back. The 24-hour tech event that was even bigger and better this year.. The ClearRoute Hackathon provided a global stage for engineers in four locations across the world to get creative and collaborate to innovate, whilst keeping a close eye on the 24-hour of Le Mans endurance race, being streamed live across all four locations. 

Both events were prolific, both performance and team-driven. The clearest parallel? Human creativity and technical ability breaking-down barriers to get to the finish line quicker. 

Here’s why the Hackathon was so great this year:

1. We transcended geographical barriers, uniting teams with a shared passion for living in the moment to solve real-time problems. 
2. We learned so much about the value of a global team; we learned how different cultural and environmental factors in different locations allowed us to play to our strengths. 
3. We had a really, really good time. 

Even better? United Autosports took the top place on the podium as both the Hackathon and the 24 Hours of Le Mans race drew to an exciting and enthralling conclusion. A final hour in a 24-hour period that we’ll never forget. We were all, across the globe, racing towards the finish line totally committed to being the best we could be as teams and individuals. 

What was the Hackathon and why now?

The Hackathon, in its second year, invited engineers to take to the coding stage to solve an agreed challenge and pitch their solution to our partners at United Autosports, under the theme of ‘endurance and performance in motorsports’.

We wanted to give our engineers and new, talented, external participants the ultimate space to flex their creative muscles and explore uncharted territory.. The Hackathon took place in our four offices in Sydney, Bulgaria, India and London, and the learnings and cultural richness derived from holding it across the world will be crucial in developing the talent and skill sets of our whole team. 

There were epic snacks, calming yoga sessions, sleeping bags and sacks of energy, as our four global offices went head to head in a searing 24-hour test of innovation, teamwork and collaboration; for anyone thinking that IT is stagnant, one-dimensional and boring then think again! The Hackathon was everything but. The passion was tangible, and the appetite for success was completely undeniable. And for our Sydney team, there were doughnuts. 

The Hackathon gave our teams the opportunity to move away from fixing problems to truly innovating solutions, breaking down silos, and inviting like-minded, passionate professionals to all input into iterating the right solution for their chosen challenge. By removing the pressures, confines, and technicalities associated with day-to-day process of delivering impact for our clients, we were able to evolve and identify new ways of working that will translate into our every day.  Positive people, positive experiences and a true thirst for championing opportunity and working together to break new ground.

So what did each national team come up with, and what did we learn?

Team India – ‘Engage Endurance’

The concept:

A cognitive endurance tracker using physiological and behavioural data. Integrating multiple data sources into a unified system to develop a model for cognitive fatigue. The fatigue model and risks scores were created using a learning model extracting data from the following points to understand driver performance:

• Heart Rate
• Body temperature
• Screen time/activity time
• Mood

The tech:

Python – Employed to create and train different risk scores through data modelling. Python’s extensive libraries for data analysis and machine learning, such as Pandas and Scikit-learn, make it ideal for developing robust predictive models. 

Amazon EC2: The application was deployed on Amazon EC2, ensuring scalable and reliable cloud infrastructure for handling large volumes of data and providing high availability. 

The tech stack enabled:

Comprehensive monitoring – integrating diverse physiological and behavioural data points for a holistic understanding of cognitive fatigue. 

Predictive modelling – using advanced machine learning techniques to predict fatigue and performance risks, aiding in proactive management.  

Scalability – deployment on Amazon EC2 offers scalability to handle increasing data and user load, ensuring consistent performance.

The people driving the solution.

Oversubscribed, a team bursting at the seams with a waiting list into the hundreds, the passion, dedication, and enthusiasm of those who made it into the final squad was evident, with a true thirst for learning and, as a group and individually, so eager to contribute. 

Mentorship and support was absolutely central to our cohort in India, and notably, the heavy emphasis on ‘family values’ to ensure everybody participating, regardless of their background, experience level and situation were given the confidence and tools to get as much from the experience as possible. In turn, their contributions and expertise as a group were outstanding. 

The conditions for success were paramount. The team leaders, who played a strong role in direction and planning strived to establish a safe and inclusive environment, that also welcomed several women to the team.

No one wanted to miss an opportunity to learn and contribute, with many of the team choosing to forgo naps over a 24 hour period to glean every drop of experience and enrichment from the event.  And it showed. 

Team India’s cultural superpower – What did we learn?

That passion, drive, and curiosity are a truly powerful mix across such an inspiring team. Living in the moment, really meant, living in every possible moment, to not miss any opportunity to learn and develop. It was truly humbling to witness their dedication and hunger to be the best they could be.

Team Australia – “ClearMind’

The concept:

To produce a means of monitoring cognitive performance (an App), which is crucial for endurance teams to optimise their mental state during training and competition. 

Cognitive functions like attention, decision making and reaction can significantly impact overall performance, especially during endurance events. Team ClearMind chose to monitor the following data points:

• Memory
• Reaction

Leveraging React Native:

Used for building the mobile application, React Native provides a seamless experience across iOS devices. React Native enables fast development cycles and efficient performance on mobile platforms. 

It provides real-time insights into critical cognitive functions, helping teams maintain peak mental performance.

Furthermore,  React Native ensures the app is accessible on iOS devices, facilitating widespread use within teams.. It also offers an intuitive and responsive user experience, essential for quick access to cognitive performance metrics.

The people driving the solution.

Working in a smaller office than in India, with a small, close-knit team of seven, the Australian team took good care of their own well-being to maximise performance. 

This meant taking appropriate and considered time to ideate and plan meticulously, especially as, because of their time zone, their challenge commenced at the stroke of midnight!

They had a Tiktok-er iOS developer in their ranks, providing exceptional, specialist insight for consideration. In addition they put strong emphasis on leveraging the latest hot themes and trends to come up with the best solution, including AI, crypto and MML; they deliberately built Generative AI into their solution. 

The whole team had created a very welcoming and open space in which to collaborate and ideate. While they made a concerted effort to take care of their individual well-being, as a group they sought to create a shared experience, taking meals and naps together to maximise the time they could collaborate. 

They also enjoyed a morale boost from Sarndeep, our CTO, and Charlie’s, our CEO respective families paying them a visit, with a cake of course, enjoying a healthy mix of feedback from the youngsters (who we know can be refreshingly honest!). 

Team Australia’s cultural superpower: What did we learn?

That morale and support can go a long way in alleviating pressure and in turn unleashing creativity. Emotional lifts and external moral support proved invaluable in successfully seeing them through the challenge. 

Team Bulgaria – ‘TyreWear Prediction System’

The concept: 

An app to anticipate tyre wear and easily check tyre condition at any time, ensuring road user and driver safety during extended journeys, utilising AI to adapt durability assessments to specific driving habits and environments. The app would use the following data points:

Age of tyre

• Tread
• Width
• Car engine
• Season
• Driving style (1-10 scale from least to most aggressive)

The tech:

Next.js -An opinionated version of React, providing server-side rendering and static site generation for better performance. –

Next UI Components – Stylish and efficient UI components that enhance the application’s visual appeal and usability.

The AI-driven insights apply learning models to predict tyre durability based on various data points, to offer personalised assessments. This improves safety, providing timely alerts on tyre condition, to support proactive maintenance and safety.

The people driving the solution.

In twelve years in his role, the Bulgaria MD took his first official sleep in the office. And he loved it. But before sleep came fuel – namely a budget-busting array of snacks and drinks to fully energise and nourish the ambitious team.

Everyone came, chomping at the bit, to give it their all, and the competitiveness was clear from the outset, keeping ideas close to their chest in a bid to get to the finish line first. In addition, everyone wanted their opportunity to shine, and the Hackathon was a unique opportunity for individuals to truly demonstrate their creative problem solving and technical abilities. 

The winning team presented their product (which was a culmination of six hours of planning followed by 18 hours of solid coding) in html format, as a working solution in github. Smart, innovative and truly professional in execution. 

Team Bulgaria’s cultural superpower: What did we learn?

A fiercely competitive approach and a hunger to win set Bulgaria apart. In the words of their MD, it is clear that there is no room for error on the quest for triumph:

“If you want to be successful, you need to apply yourself. The winning formula is in the attention to detail.”

We learned that: 

1. having a competitive element is key in driving ambitious solutions and 
2. the importance of planning. 

Team Bulgaria took the most diligent and thorough approach to the preparation phase of the challenge. This extended to how they were going to present their solution to win the hearts and dazzle the eyes of the judging panel. Professional to the end. 

Team UK – ‘PitOps’

The concept:

An application built for optimising pit stops for WEC Races, leveraging a real-time monitoring and decision-making tool for pit stops, providing actionable insights to optimise pit stop timing.

The algorithm would look at particular pit-stop actionable items to gain important margins on competitors. Upon choosing the action different permutations can be shown on how it will affect the car and driver. The algorithm pulled from the following data points:

• Fuel levels
• Tyre wear
• Track temperature
• Driver health

The tech:

React – Used for building the frontend application, ensuring a dynamic and responsive user interface. – 

GitHub Actions – Facilitates continuous integration and delivery, ensuring smooth and automated deployment processes. –

 GitHub Pages – Provides a low-cost, reliable hosting solution for the application. 

The tech stack delivers up-to-date information on crucial factors influencing pit-stop decisions, supporting and improving strategic planning, using algorithms to model different pit-stop scenarios, and aiding in optimal decision-making.

In addition, leveraging GitHub Actions and GitHub Pages ensures continuous integration and low-cost deployment, making the solution sustainable and efficient. Each application leverages specific technologies to address unique challenges in cognitive performance, safety, and optimization within endurance environments, providing comprehensive and innovative solutions to enhance performance and safety.

The people driving the solution.

It was all about the snacks. Well, mostly. In particular, Gary’s cupcakes. In actual fact, the snacks were just the cherry on the cake – it was the camaraderie and environment in which the creative process was unfolding that made the Hackathon in the UK so special. Senior team members, including the Head of People and Head of Talent, were all on hand in the office with words of encouragement and tasty treats to help keep the ideas flowing. 

There was also a real sense of professionalism and respect, which enabled the team to work iteratively, coding and then reconvening to assess, evaluate and continue. 

The winning team in the UK stuck to their plan, taking the time to get it right, rather than straying and double guessing their approach, allowing the concept to benefit from the full-time period to realise its potential.

Team UK’s cultural superpower: What did we learn?

That relaxation and the right environment are absolutely crucial in enabling creativity to flow. Without boundaries, preconceptions, and confines, expertise and innovation truly flourish. Our Head of People summed it up perfectly:

 “When people are relaxed, they do their most creative work”  

And the winner was?

Congratulations to team PitOps. It was felt that the Pit Stop algorithm had the most relevance to the theme of ‘endurance and performance in motorsports’. The idea had the greatest potential to make an impact on team performance by taking data from a number of different areas to enable better strategic decision-making. 

The concept also had longevity, with the opportunity to create extensions to include further detail and data from other points, including the weather, pit stop cameras, and other potential influencing factors on the margins for improvement in the pit lane. 

What’s even cooler is that this idea will be presented to the CTO at United Autosports towards the end of the summer, hopefully with a view to seeing it in action at next year’s 24 Hours of Le Mans endurance race. 

More than one winner. In fact, so many winners.

It was truly humbling, and a massive moment for ClearRoute, to see so many individuals and teams find their perfect way of working. From cultural influences to individual successes, every member of every team in all four locations came away with new skills, new aspirations, and new peers. We got to see everyone involved maximising every moment to work as a team to create incredible solutions.

However, we consider ourselves the real winners, as we have derived so many crucial insights to help us all work better. 

We want to make sure that the impact of the Hackathon ripples through our business, taking learnings from each region and implementing initiatives to help our team work better, smarter, and importantly, happier. 

This is why we are now actively committed to making more space each day and week for ideation, innovation, and creative problem-solving. We are more aware than ever of the importance of enabling developers and engineers to spread their creative wings for better, more innovative outcomes. 

We also now have the Community of Practice each week, facilitating constant collaboration across teams and departments, ensuring everyone is involved and learning from one another. We get together on a weekly basis to share knowledge, talk on topics and share what we do across projects. 

We also want our learnings from the Hackathon to help us continue to raise our game, so we now have an open team of engineers working on our own IP and product development collaboratively, which is gaining huge momentum and engagement. 

And let’s not forget that the Hackathon raised £1200 for Cancer Research from sponsorship.

So, if you’re interested, what actually happened at Le Mans?

The United Autosports LMPS #22 car won! With a nail-biting, excruciatingly exciting final hour that kept everyone, including our Hackathon teams, on their toes. 

A word from our CEO, Charlie Whaley, on how it felt to be in partnership with United Autosports:

“Knowing that we are part of the team, part of what will increase their performance in the future has even more invested interest. We went through all the emotions with them, minute to minute, and shared their journey, which made the win even more special.”

He continued “The great thing about Le Mans is that there are so many ups and downs. At periods through the race, all four cars (in the team) showed potential for a podium place. But you know everything can change in a moment.  The most intense moment was the last hour. “

So much more than your average tech event

This was more than just a tech event. It was a true learning experience. From collaboration and best practices through to culture and creativity, it was a true demonstration of the diversity and, consequently, the rich skill sets within our community worldwide. A full 24 hours of living in the moment had the potential to be exhausting, draining, and frustrating,  but by collaborating and having the freedom to do what they love, the teams thrived, learned new skills, and came away feeling fully accomplished (but probably ready for a nap).

What made this event extra special? Having actual problem statements from a business in the motor racing industry and the tangibility of the solution being able to be applied in real life – tying it back to an actual event that was going on at the same time. But more importantly, the chance to ideate and create that solution without the client pressure and confines of coding processes and problem-fixing demands. 

And as we’ve mentioned from the outset, it was really, really good fun. 

We’d like to extend a huge thank you to everyone involved, and the hard work that went into this event. We look forward to running this event again next year but loved it so much we are looking at additional opportunities to host more Hackathons between now and the next Le Mans, so watch this space.