Saline High School seniors are Michigan's best young auto techs

DEARBORN, Mich., April 25, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- For the third consecutive year, Saline High School took first place in the Michigan state final of the annual Ford/AAA Student Auto Skills Competition, held today at the Macomb Community College Expo Center in Warren. Evan Fischbach and Tommy Michaluk won top honors for perfectly diagnosing and repairing electrical and mechanical "bugs" deliberately placed in a 2012 Ford Fusion in just 29 minutes, 14 seconds.

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The victory means $32,000 in scholarship prizes for the two students, who also took home top honors in the written exam of the contest.  Their instructor, Tim Timoszyk, has led the Saline team to victory for three years.

The winning team will compete for additional scholarship dollars and the chance to kick start their automotive careers when they represent Michigan in the national Ford/AAA Student Auto Skills Competition at Ford World Headquarters on June 12.

Devon Krajniak and Thomas Gibson of Fitzgerald High School in Warren placed second in the contest with a perfectly repaired vehicle.  Their instructor is Ralph Romain. Third-place honors went to Robert Asbury and Ryan Leisenring of Delta-Schoolcraft I.S.D. Career Technical Center in Escanaba. Their instructor is Michael Gardner.

The teams competing today earned their places in the state contest by outscoring other Michigan high school teams during an Internet-based exam in February. 

Nearly $12 million in scholarships are available at the state and national level from Ford/AAA Student Auto Skills. Both the national and state-wide competitions are organized with the support of Ford personnel, local automotive instructors and AAA's Approved Auto Repair program, a public service AAA performs to identify quality repair facilities throughout the country.

SOURCE AAA Michigan