The Derby in " The Wood"

Yes, it is that time of year again. When I get to attempt to build a fast Pinewood Derby car. Will gave me a challenge this year when he brought home a block of wood with just a little piece cut out of one corner. He explained to me he wanted his car to be a semi-truck. I thought great that will be really aerodynamic. I explained to Will that his design may not be the fastest, but he said he didn't care. He really wanted a truck. 

So I did what any good dad would do, I set out to make it the fastest truck anyone has ever seen. I sanded the wheels & axles more than usual. I added lots of graphite to the axles, balanced it with just the right amount of weights and attempted to line the wheels up perfectly. Last night was the derby. We arrived early to size up our competition. Actually I was the only one scouting, Will was bouncing around happy as ever just dying to watch his truck race on the track. At that point I think Will was still oblivious to the thought of wanting to win. Several kids and even parents expressed their "concern" about the shape of Will's vehicle and told him that he didn't have any chance of winning. As I sat there and listened, I thought just wait and see if Will's truck was as slow as they assumed. After hearing how his truck couldn't win I think Will wanted to prove a few of the other boys wrong.

Well he won his first heat, a fluke I guess. He won his second heat, huh! Well he did end up losing a few races, but received THIRD PLACE overall. Not bad for a square vehicle. The elusive 1st place continues to escape me, but between Jack & Will, we now have one 2nd place, two 3rd place, and one 4th place finish. I still have 5 more of these derbies to go (2 for Will & 3 for Seth).

Maybe next year will be mine, as long as Will doesn't decide to do a tank. By the way, I loved seeing the expression on the faces of the few parents who showed concern over Will's truck initially as they saw it beat their child's car. Not that I'm competitive or anything like that.