The BBA is good to us Moms & Dads, for Mother’s day they put together a big brunch, and for Father’s day they brought they decided on a box car derby! Apparently these things are pretty big in the States, I guess the Boy Scouts of America have some pretty big box car racing events, complete with a bunch of strict rules on car design, etc.
We had no such restrictions, however, so we could put as much weight and other bits on our cars as we wanted!
As you can see, there was quite an assortment of cars brought on the day. What they did is give the kids a choice from about three kits, each kit consisted of a block of wood vaguely in the shape of a car, some wheels, axles, and weights. What we did with them after that was up to us. Generally speaking most of the dads just painted up the block of wood and stuck on the wheels and as much weight as possible – I took a little extra time and molded the wood a bit with my electric sander and a saw to make the kids’ cars a little different than the rest, which they enjoyed!
Ryley requested a Bumblebee – so I managed to put together a fun little car for her, painted black and yellow (Ryley helped!), complete with wings and antennae. I am proud to say it was one of the faster cars on the day, we won a few races but came up short near the end.
Josh wanted a red car with blue stripes – so I altered his block of wood quite a bit (it was originally more like a ‘Hummer’ vehicle), Josh helped me paint it up, and I finished it off with his favorite number on the roof – #7. He was pretty happy with his ‘Red Racer’. He won his first race but was beaten out after that. He was so happy after his win, though – totally worth the effort.
I’m not sure where the BBA got the track from, but it was an ‘official’ track, four lanes of nice and smooth aluminum with a proper spring-loaded starting block at the top. Rumor has it next year they are going to up it to eight lanes with a proper electronic timing system – Josh may be invited back as a BBA alumni, but if not, Ryley will still be there – we’ll get ’em next year!
Soon as the races and Father’s lunch was over, we dashed out to the airport as we were leaving for our Texas vacation later that afternoon! It was a fun little project to do with the kids, can’t wait for next year!