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It was an interesting mix of innocence and competition all rolled into a crowded church gymnasium. The row of anxious six-year-old girls lining the side of the four-lane, aluminum track, sparked with the look of their first time in the limelight of competitiveness.
One of those little girls was my granddaughter, Jayne. Jayne and her friend Adelyn represented their local Daisy Girl Scout Troop in the district Pinewood Derby.
The Pinewood Derby has been around for a while. The brainchild of Cubmaster Donald Murphy came to life on May 15, 1953, at the local Scout House in Manhattan Beach, California.
“I wanted to devise a wholesome constructive activity that would foster a closer father-son relationship and promote craftsmanship and good sportsmanship through competition,” Murphy said.
For 57 years it was a Cub Scouts, boys-only competition.
In 2010, the Girl Scouts of America held their first competition. While the Girl Scouts remains a female-only organization, the Boy Scouts are now co-ed.
It didn’t matter last Saturday afternoon at the Harrison City Community Church in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania.
The girls competed in age divisions, with Daisy’s, the youngest division, competing last. When the girls were finished, the Wolves/Bears and Lions/Webelos set up for their races.
Jayne competed last year as a five-year-old with marginal results.
This time, her dad Adam, and I were determined to help her build a faster racecar.
The rules are straightforward. The car can’t be longer than seven inches, wider than 2 ¾ inches, and must weigh less than five ounces.
Each scout was given an official car-building kit. It contained a block of pine, four nails that served as axles, and four plastic wheels. That was it.
You couldn’t add anything else except weight. No washers, bushing, wheel bearings, oil or grease.
Additional weight could be added to reach the five-ounce limit.
Last year, we drilled holes in the bottom of the car, added nickels until the weight limit was reached, and then filled the holes.
Adam researched the fastest designs, the best weight placement, and the various techniques to build a faster car.
Jayne wanted a Scotch Highlander design for her car. She is fascinated by our Highland cow Madonna. We gave Jayne and her little sister Norah Highland cow dolls we found at a quaint shop in rural Scotland for Christmas, and it just added to the mystic of a “Madonna Car.”
Jayne drew the design she wanted on the side of the wood block, and we took it to our friend Dave Maloney who had a woodshop.
I cut the pattern with Dave’s bandsaw, then sanded it on a belt sander and then an orbital sander.
Jayne mixed various colors of tempura paint to get the desired orange/brown tone of an authentic Highlander. She then painted the top and sides of the car with a stiff, wide bristle brush that presented the look of heavy, hairy cowhide.
Another gift we gave the girls from Scotland was a box of “Heelind Coos Poo.” (that’s how the Scots pronounce it) The chips resembled a cow pie but thankfully tasted like European-style chocolate.
The image on the box was a friendly, cartoon Highlander. Jayne’s mom Staci took a photo with her phone, did a little Photoshop magic, and printed it on a color printer.
Jayne cut out the cow, pasted it on the car. She painted grass in front of the cow and the design was ready.
The car weighed just over two ounces.
Adam picked up flat, lead weights at a JoAnnes Fabric in Greensburg.
The clothing store had an entire section dedicated to pinewood derby cars and accessories.
We chose lead weights, but other fathers paid a little extra for bismuth and tungsten weights. The wheel clearance allowed the weights to be screwed in under the car.
It had a double purpose. First, the extra weight made a faster car, and the placement underneath lowered the center of gravity, also adding speed.
You can’t modify the wheels or the finish nail axles, but you can polish the axles, spin the wheels with a drill to remove any edges and dry graphite can be added to speed up rotation. Adam and Jayne did all those steps.
A Boy Scout troop manned stations measuring, weighing, and testing that all four wheels touched the track. A car riding on three wheels is faster than four, but that’s cheating.
As the pre-teen scouts did their business, I joked to the two kids on the scale, “There might be a $20 in my pocket if the car makes weight.”
They just laughed and said, “Sure, we’ll take the money, but it made weight already.”
The track was a four-lane, aluminum raceway 50 feet long. The lower end was elevated two feet above the floor and the starting gate rose four feet above the lower track. A race official flipped a lever dropping the cars evenly and they rolled down the track.
An auto-timing device, similar to those used at drag races and at track meets recorded the speed to four decimal places.
As a first grader, Jayne reads at a sixth-grade level, and her math skills aren’t far behind. She was able to calculate her position after each heat. The race had eight little girls bringing their cars to the track.
Each car is timed in all four lanes. That means four heats per car with the times added together to determine a winner.
Jayne’s car won the first heat, took second in the second heat, then she won the third and final heat. She kept track of her times, from a slow heat of 3.24 seconds to her fastest race at 3.11 seconds.
She looked at us and with an inquisitive expression held up one, then two fingers, indicating she knew she was going to finish first or second.
With all the drama associated with announcing winners these days, the troop leader presenting the trophies gave the award for most creative design first. The girls voted on this category and two little girls received the first and second place trophies.
The third-place car was announced, leaving Jayne and the little girl with the white roadster, painted with red strips Alfa Romeo style.
Jayne was reserved but had a huge grin when the other girl was announced in second place. Her car had won by a combined two-tenths of a second overall.
She hugged the trophy all the way home in the rear seat of the van and wanted to take it into Olive Garden where she celebrated her win with calamari and noodles Alfredo, but her mom said to keep it in the vehicle.
She told me she wants to win again next year, and already has plans for a faster car.
Think of a heavy cell phone on wheels and you have the idea.
She entered the world of competition. All the girls received merit badges for entering, but only the winner’s received trophies. That’s a lesson more kids need to learn in our modern era.