Oscar Piastri, Formula One Driver with the McLaren Formula 1 team, has become a household name over the last few years, making his full time debut in 2023 and scoring his first F1 podium in Japan this year. But Piastri didn’t make his racing debut on the Formula One track, in fact, it was right here in Maryborough, when he competed in the 2013 Energy Breakthrough for Haileybury College.

With the countdown on for the 2023 Energy Breakthrough, we know our teams are working hard to finalise their trikes and pushcarts, perfect their racing lines, and get race ready. We caught up with the team from Epsom Primary School at a recent training session to see how they’re tracking for the event.

Welcome to Term 4 ... or as we like [...]

In 2022, we introduced a new way for students to showcase their work in preparing for the Energy Breakthrough - by allowing students in the puscharts and secondary HPV events to submit their Display and Presentation virtually by video. We received some incredible submissions from our teams last year, so we’ve decided to do it again! Check out our Top ten tips for your virtual Display and Presentation.

As part of the Energy Breakthrough initiative, the Central Goldfields Shire Council is seeking responses to tenders for a wide range of EB contracts.

Over 60 Team Managers joined us for a Webinar on Thursday 8th June to receive an important 2023 Program Update. A recording and summary of the exciting new changes are now available online here!

The Energy Breakthrough Education Team invite all interested Team Managers to join us for a Webinar on Thursday 8th June to receive an important 2023 Program Update. If you have a team entered in this year’s event, we strongly encourage you to block out the time to attend. A recording will be made available afterwards.

Applications to enter the 2023 Energy Breakthrough have roared in from across the state on day one of our entry period. The day was highlighted by a number of new schools, rural schools and a strong home-town representation from Maryborough schools, too.

Our Schools Handbooks for the 2023 Energy Breakthrough (EB) is now live in the Team Managers' Hub page on our website. Please note that there are two Parts: A and Part B and they should be ready in conjunction with the specific ‘Handbook’ for each category. Entries for all categories will now open at 12noon on Monday 20th March 2023. Within this update is some key points for 2023 that we wish to highlight.

Welcome to 2023! We hope that the buzz of being back at school and into the swing of things. We wanted to share a quick update for schools about this year's Energy Breakthrough program including categories of entry, entry open and closing dates and our new Team Manager Hub.

It was an electrifying finish between our two 19-hour trial winners, Bendigo Senior Secondary College’s (BSSC) Earth Mover and Peninsula Human Power’s Hare & Forbes  in the final minutes of the 2022 Energy Breakthrough. Despite representing different categories (EEV Single power source and HPV Open categories respectively), there wasn’t much between these two teams throughout the duration of the event. A particularly impressive feat for Hare & Forbes given the absence of an external power source!

The Energy Breakthrough is more than just an event. We’ve heard time and time again about the impact it’s made on young people’s lives. How it’s helped them get through high school, make life-long friends, inspired their career choices, and even start their own community teams so they can continue the racing long after their last Maryborough checked flag has been flown. 

In a pilot program consisting of just four schools, we asked participants to work together to code and navigate a Sphero Bolt Robot to perform a series of complex tasks in a set of three challenges.