Two of the 18 surviving teams contesting for the Google Lunar Xprize said that they are all set to have their interesting race against each other on the dusty plains of the moon. The winner of the race will claim for the top prize award money of US$20 million.

Do not be so excited, as this race would have slow start. US team, Astrobotic Technology is being backed by Carnegie Mellon University and the Japanese team has the support of Tokyo University. Both the teams have agreed to have a race and crawl to a finish line 500 meters away.

Lunar rover of American team has been named Griffin and the second team has yet to name its rover. Eight years ago, the Lunar Xprize was launched. As per its rule, the first private team has to land a robot on the moon and move 500 meters on, above or below the lunar surface before the end of 2016 and it will win US$20 million.

However, as per the revised rules, teams should schedule their flight date no later than December 3, 2015 and reach the moon by the end of 2016. It is said that the US team has reserved a launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle for October 2015.

The other team will also be making the trip with them along with two other teams. Astrobotic and Hakuto did so to split the launch costs.