- Stanley, a robotic vehicle designed by a Stanford University team, appeared to earn its creators a $2 million prize on Saturday by being the fastest finisher on a 132-mile course through the Nevada desert.

The race, called the Grand Challenge, was a Pentagon project meant to promote the development of technologies for 21st-century automated warfare. The car was not immediately declared the winner because officials were doing final calculations, but race times on the event's Web site indicated that it had come in several minutes ahead of two entries from Carnegie Mellon University.

Every last member of Red Team was compelled to commit seppuku...