19 November 2024
As a child, Lieutenant Alina Hutton spent hours around classic cars with her dad.
But for the self-described ‘revhead’, landing a work experience gig in England with motorsport-powerhouse McLaren Racing was never part of the plan.
“I was raised to love cars, but never in a million years did I think I would be working in a McLaren engineering team,” Lieutenant Hutton said.
The ADFA Mechanical Engineering student and Royal Australian Electrical and Mechanical Engineers officer is back in Australia after her six-week stint at McLaren Racing.
Engineering students must complete a type of industry-led training or work placement.
After originally applying for V8 supercars Australia, she tried her luck in F1.
What she found was an environment set up to foster the next generation of racing talent.
After a week of training with McLaren design software, she teamed up with an experienced engineer and got to work.
'Universities can’t teach job-specific skills as they are vastly different in each role and discipline; it isn’t until we are immersed within the workforce that we can learn our job role.'
The McLaren Racing Design and Engineering Group work to create an edge over their competition, often measured by milliseconds.
She couldn’t comment about her work after signing a non-disclosure agreement.
“Engineering in practice is vastly different to the principles and theoretical concepts we learn in the classroom,” Lieutenant Hutton said.
“Universities can’t teach job-specific skills as they are vastly different in each role and discipline; it isn’t until we are immersed within the workforce that we can learn our job role.”
But it wasn’t all hard work. As well as visiting several manufacturing facilities, she got to go for a spin in a McLaren Artura.
But the highlight was meeting Formula One star, fellow Australian and McLaren Racing driver Oscar Piastri.
Lieutenant Hutton will complete a thesis on improving the performance of mid-90s Porsche engines at a Porsche racing workshop in Sydney before finishing her degree.
Expect to see some revved-up Bushmasters and Hawkeis tearing across the training area in the near future.
