The Checkered Flag is Down!

Move over Lightning McQueen!  Speed comes in very small packages round these parts.  

Tuesday was the pinewood derby at the Date Festival, so Dennis and the boys spent much of the 4 day weekend in the garage cutting, sanding, grinding, measuring, and calibrating.  Whatever.  I say hammer some wheels on a block of wood and your good to go.  I better bite my tongue.  Dennis has been majoring in Derby Car Engineering Science for 5 years now, and has acquired quite a vast store of knowledge (valuable knowledge, I might add) on how to achieve speed in with exactly 5 ounces of wood, wheels, and weights.  With six boys, we figure he will have to make a minimum of 18 cars in his career (but he has made close to that many already, and our guys are only halfway through the cub scout era) - and if he is going to be making cars, they better be winning cars.

Oh, pardon me.  Did I say Dennis made the cars?  Of course I meant he assisted the boys in making the cars.  My bad.  Of course he was just there to make sure the kids didn't chop off their fingers (or play with, or in any way do anything to mess up the alignment of the vehicles.)

But all of their hard work paid off Tuesday night when all three boys came home with trophies.

Even though Caleb is not yet in cub scouts, he convinced his dad that he needed his own car.  Who can say no to that kid and his big brown eyes?  Caleb'c car "Dino-Mite" competed in the "open" category, and got third place!  He is so proud.  He has been carrying his trophy and ribbon everywhere!

Of course Derek and Dylan, being twins, had to compete against each other in the same "Bear Cubs" category. Dylan's "Red Racer" beat Derek's "Solid Gold" in the first heat, but then they both won all of their other heats so they got to face each other again in the final. 

They tied twice before Derek, who won the coin toss for the faster track, won by the slightest margin.  Dylan came in second.

Then Derek's Solid Gold got to compete against the winners off all the divisions for the fastest overall prize, and made it to the final heat, against the girl who won the open division.  She won the coin toss for the faster track, but they still tied 4 times before she finally beat Derek out by just a tad.  Oh well.  Still, a first place trophy is pretty great, and it all made for an exciting evening at the races.

But it is not over.  The cub scouts' pack derby is next week, and the pit crew is already working on souping up the vehicles for their next run.  Vroooom  Vroooom!  

 Do those boys have a great dad or what?