Pinewood Derby Time

For those that are familiar with Scouts, every year the Cub Scouts have a Pinewood Derby. The boys get to make their own car, paint it, add numbers to it, whatever they would like to make it their own. Since this is Ethan's first year of scouts he had that opportunity. With Woody's help, they worked on his car for about three to four weeks trying toget everything just right. They sanded and painted and added weights, spun the wheels in graphite, etc. The car itself could weigh up to 5oz. and I think they had it at 4.9oz. Ethan did a great job and I'm glad Woody got in to help him because I probably would have been fine with a box car and a little paint. Race day arrived and there were 28 boy scouts with cars to race. The event actually went fairly quickly considering each one raced their cars eight times! They even had them connected to a computer which kept track of the times and all. Ethan's car appeared to be racing very well and was taking first in almost all of his races. Well, when all was said and done, Ethan actually came in 5th place out of 28 boys. He was pretty happy about that.However, I was more proud when he told me that he tried to cheer up a boy whose car wasn't doing so well. We had been reminding Ethan the weeks before the race that he may or may not win but to just have fun. I think that he did and Woody did also...he's ready to make his own car next year so he can race one. I'm also grateful that Ethan took the time to think about someone else. I've only got a few shots of the race because a boy kept popping his head up just as I would take the picture. The car was named "The Flamer".