What is GNCTR?

Since 1975 engineering students from schools across North America have been competing in the Great Northern Concrete Toboggan Race (GNCTR). The student-run competition requires teams to design, build and race a concrete toboggan downhill in a series of events. In January of 2023, Guelph’s team of 40 dedicated members competed in the longstanding competition for the third time alongside 400+ students in Kelowna, British Columbia. ​

Each team must construct a toboggan weighing less than 350 lbs that can safely carry 5 riders down the competition hill. The toboggan must also include steering and braking systems that meet the competition’s rigorous safety standards. Toboggans are judged on superstructure design, integration of theme, technical aspects, concrete mix and runner design, overall speed and various other performance metrics. ​

Not only does the GNCTR give engineering students an opportunity to learn both hands-on and soft skills, but it also provides another front to expose North America to Guelph’s Engineering program and its partners.  ​

SPONSORSHIP

As a student-run club, GNCTR Guelph is able to operate with generous financial donations from corporate sponsors, the University of Guelph, and students. Monetary donations are the most valuable form of sponsorship to get our team to the GNCTR Competition each year! From past years, the expected annual cost for 2025 is summed at over $35,000. We can also accept other donations, such as building materials, concrete supplies, and equipment. If you have a product or service you would like to promote to a large group of engineering students from across Canada, we are happy to help you do so.

We host many fundraisers and are always looking for new partnerships with local businesses to host these events.

The direct benefits of your donation can be seen below. Non-monetary contributions will be accepted alongside a quote of your services/materials and represented as a monetary value. Please note we can produce a charitable donation receipt for tax purposes, however, we can not offer any of the promotional material seen in the table below if we do so.

You can find our sponsorship package by clicking the “Learn More” button below.

Please contact us at gnctr@uoguelph.ca with any questions or next steps!

Our Team

Our team of over 40 engineering students is led by a dedicated executive team. All executive members bring valuable skill-sets that align with the vision of the team. With their experience and excellent leadership qualities they re preapred to carry our team to success.

Adele is a 3rd-year Biomedical Engineering Student and has been a member of the team since her first year at Guelph. Adele brings experience in design and leadership from past projects to the team. She is excited to keep GNCTR tradition alive and help create an innovative toboggan to competition in 2024!

Emma is a 4th-year Environmental Engineering Co-op student. Since joining the team in 2022, she has developed a passion for school representation at competition. Emma brings experience in research and project management to this role, and is ready to achieve award-winning status in 2025!

Jaydon is a 3rd-year Mechanical Engineering student. He joined GNCTR in 2022 and brings valuable auto shop, welding and machining experience to the team. Jaydon is excited to perform superstructure CAD design work this year, while helping to improve and advance the team’s mechanical systems.

Daniel is a 4th-year Mechanical Engineering student. He will be returning for his second year as the brake lead, bringing new ideas and reinforced designs from last years’ toboggan. With his previous SolidWorks experience, Daniel is ready to “touch down” in the 2025 season.

#allgasnobrakes

Lauren is a 3rd-year Biomedical Engineering student. Since joining the GNCTR team in 2023, she has recognized the importance of team spirit and developing a theme that drives our success. As Spirit Lead this year, she is excited to kick off the season with enthusiasm and bring the Guelph spirit to the competition in Montreal!

Owen is a 3rd-year Mechanical Engineering student.

Franklin is a 2nd-year Mechanical Engineering student. He joined GNCTR in 2023 and brings valuable welding and CNC manufacturing experience to the team. Franklin is excited to collaborate with the superstructure team on this years design while strengthening his CAD skills.

Kristi is a 4th-year Biomedical Engineering Student and has been a member of the team since 2022. As the inaugural Safety Lead, she is thrilled to contribute to the team’s shop safety and report preparation to ensure our riders are safe and sound as they travel down the hill.

superstructure DESIGN

Each year, GNCTR Guelph designs and fabricates a toboggan that meets a vast list of criteria and constraints. Typical criteria include the toboggan possessing a fully functioning braking and steering mechanism and a fully contained roll cage, as well as the total weight of the assembled toboggan being under 350 lbs. Advanced engineering software such as Solidworks, ANSYS, and MasterCAM are paired with academic engineering knowledge learned in coursework to bring concepts to reality.

The steering mechanisms are typically inspired by assemblies seen on go-karts, bobsleds, and many other hobby vehicles. The braking mechanisms usually represent a dragging claw or anchor, used to stop the toboggan safely from speeds up to 60 km/h. The entire frame is subject to advanced simulations and testing in the scenarios of frontal impact, side impact, and complete rollover to ensure the safety of its five riders. The team must provide an in-depth Safety Report to the organizing committee of the competition before any fabrication can begin, and defend all designs in a cumulative technical report and presentation that is analyzed by industry professionals.

The toboggan is fabricated in-house by GNCTR Guelph team members, all students of engineering at Guelph. Members apply many different manufacturing and fabrication processes’ learned throughout their study at the University of Guelph such as drilling, tapping, welding, and even writing CNC code required for advanced machining utilizing state-of-the-art CNC lathes and mills.

CONCRETE DESIGN

True to its name of the “Great Northern CONCRETE Toboggan Race”, it is specified that any running surface of the toboggan in contact with the ground must be constructed out of concrete. This adds complexity to the design and overall construction of the toboggan for the team but creates a great opportunity to push creativity and explore the limits of various concrete mixtures.

As the competition has evolved over the years, a larger emphasis has been placed on creating thinner and lighter skis (commonly referred to as runners) to enhance the toboggan’s performance down the hill. The runner’s concrete mix can contain many different aggregates, each of which produces varying qualities in the cured structure. There are major constraints that the concrete design must adhere to, which include:

• -50% of the cementitious materials in the composition must be Portland cement

• The design must meet a compressive strength established by the organizing committee of the competition (typically >20 MPa)

• The only permissible surface additive to the runners can be ski wax.

This leaves much of the design of the concrete running surface open to interpretation, including reinforcement techniques, mounting mechanisms to the superstructure, and the overall geometry the runners will take. At the competition, the ideal mix is deemed to be the one that features the highest strength/weight ratio and achieves this in a creative way. Aspects of creativity are rewarded in the judgment of the concrete mixture design, theme incorporation, and reinforcement structure and materials. All mixtures and runners are poured in-house at the team’s shop, and the development of these mixtures expands the team’s knowledge and provides hands-on experience when joining the GNCTR team at Guelph.

The team has an internal goal of sustainability in all aspects of the design and fabrication of the runners.

Theme

A unique and creative aspect of the competition is the incorporation of a general theme. The theme is most commonly a popular pop-culture reference, combined with a play-on-words including ‘toboggan’. The theme is incorporated into all aspects of the toboggan design, the technical exhibition display, and team members’ costumes. Teams are judged on their enthusiasm and general theme presentation. Our theme for 2024 is “Avatar: The Last Bogg-Bender”

Previous themes include “The Wizard of Bogg”, “Bogg Scouts”, “Fresh Gryphs of Bogg-Air”, and “To Infinity and Tbogg”.

Past Sponsors

Each year, GNCTR Guelph partners with several generous sponsors to help our toboggan design come to life and to bring our dedicated team to our competition. We wouldn’t be where we are today without the support of our past partners!

2023-2024 Team

 2022-2023 TEAM

GNCTR Guelph performed impressively at the 2023 competition, hosted by UBC Okanagan in Kelowna, British Columbia. Our theme was “The Wizard of Bogg”, inspired by the classic musical. Guelph completed four runs down the hill at Big White, setting a club record for most runs completed at a competition. Our toboggan reached the “King of the Hill” competition for the first time in club history and placed third on race day! Guelph placed 14th out of fifteen teams overall. The returning team members are excited to improve their knowledge of concrete molding to produce lighter skis and explore using different types of steel to improve Toboggan Design scores at the competition in 2024!

2019-2020 TEAM

GNCTR Guelph attended the competition held in Toronto in January of 2020. The competition showcased various designs and yielded many creative discussions for our 2020 toboggan. The team placed 16th overall of 21 and placed 3rd in the Safety category. This marked our team’s first complete run in the 4 years we’ve been competing. Our theme was “Bogg Scouts”, which was based off Boy Scouts. Innovations over the previous year include incorporating theme into the overall toboggan design, reducing overall frame size and material usage, a momentum based brake system, and producing thinner, and lighter runners.

Executive Team:

• Co-Captains - Rebecca Shaw & Tyler Hutchison

• Superstructure Co-Leads - Ande Doornekamp & Michelle Robinson

• Concrete Co-Leads - Randall Vandyk & Shannon Fenwick

• Jr. Concrete Officer - Tiana Bressan

• Theme Lead - Dayna McNeill

• Technical Officer - Ciara Tersigni

• Sponsorship Lead - Samantha McGill

• Faculty Advisor: Dr. Ryan Clemmer

Past Teams

2019: The Fresh Gryphs of Bogg-Air

GNCTR Guelph team attended the competition held in Waterloo in February of 2019. The team placed 19th overall of 22. Our theme was “The Fresh Gryphs of Bogg-Air”, which was based off the popular 90’s show, Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Innovations over the previous year include incorporating theme into the overall toboggan design, reducing frame size and material usage, a momentum based brake system, and producing thinner, and lighter runners. The team also introduced active suspension for the first time ever.

Executive Team:

• Co-Captains - Justin Pinzon & Grant Costello

• Concrete Lead - Marshall Kovacs

• Superstructure Lead- Jameson Bonnett

• Theme & Spirit Lead - Hope Blissett

• Financial Lead - Rebecca Shaw

• Sponsorship Lead - Pier-Luc Nadeau-Labadie

• Faculty Advisor: Dr. Ryan Clemmer

2018: To Infinity and T-Bogg!

Our past GNCTR Guelph team attended the competition held in Waterloo, in January of 2018. The team placed 16th overall of 25 and placed 2nd in the Theme category. Our theme was “To Infinity and Tbogg”, based off Toy Story. Innovations over the previous year include incorporating theme into the overall toboggan design, reducing overall frame size and material usage, a momentum based brake system, and producing thinner, and lighter runners.

Executive Team:

• Captain - Justin Pinzon

• Superstructure Lead - Grant Costello

• Concrete Lead - Marshall Kovacs

• Theme Lead - Vincent Albanese

• Co-Treasurers - Hope Blissett & Megan Lawton

• Communications Lead - Kevin Stewart

• Faculty Advisor: Dr. Ryan Clemmer

2017: Barnyard Bogganers

Our first competing GNCTR Guelph team attended the competition held in Winnipeg, MB. in January of 2017. The competition opened our eyes to the scope of GNCTR, and the true potential of our toboggan, The theme for the 2017 team was “The Barnyard Boggoners”, which was based off U of G’s recognition for their agriculture programs. The teams successful attendance at competition layed the foundations for the club to build upon year after year.

Executive Team:

• Co-Captains - Scott Terry & Megan Smith

• Superstructure Lead - Luke Salter

• Theme Leads - Melissa Vogl & Morgan Kelly

• Construction Lead - Josh South

• Financial Lead - Cassidy Amber-Goetz

• Fundraising Lead - Katie Morris

• Faculty Advisor - Dr. Ryan Clemmer

Contact Us

We’d love to hear from you regarding sponsorship, general inquires, and feedback!

our shop

University of Guelph

School of Engineering

c/o Guelph GNCTR

50 Stone Rd. E, N1G 2W1

Guelph, Ontario, Canada