Re: Pinewood derby winning

We solved most of our 'loser' problems in our Pinewood by changing the way
we ran the race. An engineer father installed timers for each track
(accurate to .01 second); each boy then ran 4 races (no ELIMINATION or
seeding) against 4 semi-random other boys and we recorded the time on a
poster. Everyone received a car stand made from recycled oak pallets and
the 3 fastest times for each rank got a trophy at the end. So, everyone
got something, the winners got trophies, and EVERYONE "won" at least one of
their races. So, everyone raced the same number of times (on each track)
and no one lost interest or had the disappointment of being knocked out of
competition. Although the parents could tell, the kids didn't realize that
they could look at the posted times and figure out if they were in the
trophy race or not, so the excitement remained. It worked extremely well,
no charges of 'bad calls' and no tears. Plus, we ran 4 races for 45 kids in
around an hour.

Jim H

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