BMW has added another important electric model to the 160 1 Series ActiveE and 40 Mini E battery cars that are helping to keep the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games moving, shuttling athletes and officials around the Olympic Park and surrounding venues.
From today the mini Mini, a specially built, radio controlled electric car will be used on the field of play in the Olympic Stadium to ferry javelins, discuses, hammers and shots back from the field to the throwing area, saving valuable time during competition.
Three of them will be operated by trained staffers bearing the grand title of Games Makers.
The cars are roughly a quarter the size of a real Mini, finished in blue with the same livery as the fleet cars, and carry the equipment in a compartment accessed through an adapted sunroof.
Each mini Mini will cover about 6000 metres a day in four-hour shifts across nine days of Olympic and nine days of Paralympic competition, carrying loads of up to eight kilograms - a single hammer, discus or shot or two javelins.
Their control systems have deliberately been kept very simple and should require minimum technical support; they have a radio control range of about 100 metres, and their batteries can take 35 minutes of continuous running, and then be fully recharged in 80 minutes.