SPONSORSHIP LIFT FOR RACING TEAM

The University of Wolverhampton Race team benefited from asparkling sponsorship lift recently when local company,Mercia Lifting Gear Ltd, gifted them arange of automotive cleaning products –all of them personalised for students and staffmembers of theteam.

Mercia Group, based in Willenhall, specialise in a range of services including large lifting equipment, the supply of solar panels, battery storage, electrical wholesale and have just launched a range of consumable cleaning products. the company was founded in 1982 as afamily businessheaded up by Don Mead and Ron Clarke, akeen motorsport enthusiast. Ron passed away in 2022.

The company has pledged morethan £30,000 to various projects across the university, but theUWR team is close to the company’sheart, with the late founder,Ron, having never realised his dream of going to see aFormula One race.

Steve Clarke, Ron’sson, who heads up the company alongside other family members, said: “This is avery poignant partnership for us because my dad was akeen motorsport fan, which is why we got involved with the team. sadly,hepassed away last year without seeing the team race.

“Weare alocal company and we arecommitted to putting things back into our community.it’sabsolutely fantastic what the university is doing with the team on the engineering courses, and if we can help secureyoungsters a future, we areall forthat.”

The company recently introduced arange of cleaning consumables into the business.

During the past year the company has sponsored UWR with the cleaning consumables and anew gearbox worth £14,000 for the student team’sPraga R1 car,but is also extending its support of the students by sponsoring aroom at the university’sSchool of Architectureand Built Environment.

Jamie Fereday,contracts manager at Mercia, said: “Weare working on acouple of exciting projects at the university in relation to energy solutions, and some have a crossover with the race team.”