I love the cubscout pinewood derby. When my first born son was put into my arms one of the first things I looked forward to was the derby. For the last many years, I have taken on running the derby as my own special project and we held our pack's derby this past weekend at church and in coordination with a chili cookoff and had a blast. A lot of people came out and in addition to the cubs, there was an 'open' class for anyone who wanted to bring a car for separate racing. The rules for open where more relaxed (i.e. no combustibles) and I also made an effort to keep the event exciting by reducing the time between races. This seemed to work and the crowd excitement seemed somewhat constant.
I've also helped the boys (and anyone else interested) in making their cars and I really like that one of the lessons of the derby is that there are no shortcuts to making a fast car. Most folks focus on car shape and design which is one part of the equation but miss out on proper weight and reduction of friction. These three pieces of the puzzle work together to make a faster car. The designs this year where great and I wish I had time to take more pictures but I was managing brackets and shuffling cars.
I usually make a car myself each year and this year went with a classic race car design. It is a model of a 1939 Auto Union Type D And I was really pleased with the results. I've included pictures of my car and the original below for comparison.
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| Original |
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| Original |
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| Front View Model |
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| Top View Model |
The car also performed well and won the open division but not without some close competition. I realize of course that I now have a large target on my back for next year but that just makes it more fun.
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