\n
![](\"http:\/\/msnbcmedia.msn.com\/i\/MSNBC\/Components\/Photo\/_new\/100426-coslog-illuminati-466px-1215p.jpg\") \n Illuminati Motor Works<\/FONT><\/DIV><\/TD><\/TR> \n \n \n Members of the Illuminati Motor Works team hoist their Seven automobile onto a flatbed trailer for the trip from their Illinois garage to X Prize trials in Michigan. Nate Knappenburger holds Seven in place while Thomas Pasko secures a wheel. \n \n<\/FONT><\/DIV><\/TD><\/TR><\/TBODY><\/TABLE><\/DIV> \n After months of technologizing and tinkering, dozens of next-generation automobiles are converging on a Michigan speedway for the first round of on-track tests leading to $10 million in prizes. For some teams, this may be the end of the road.<\/P> “It’s certainly possible that some teams may not make it all the way through shakedown,” Eric Cahill, senior director of the Progressive Insurance Automotive X Prize,<\/A> told me today from the Michigan International Speedway in Brooklyn, Mich.<\/P> Twenty-eight teams from around the world – ranging from high-school and college students to backyard inventors and honest-to-goodness automakers – are bringing 36 super-fuel-efficient vehicles to the speedway for this first phase of the X Prize competition.<\/p>\n |