Each Fall, the AWANA program hosts a pinewood derby, called the AWANA Grand Prix. It is a fun, competitive event that aims to get fathers involved with their children, and also involved in the AWANA program.
The competition consists of taking a pinewood block and cutting it and sanding it to shape it as desired. Weights must be added to get the car as close to 5 ounces as possible, without going over. The car kit comes with axels and "official" Awana Grand Prix wheels. I am pretty sure that the magic behind the whole competition is figuring out how to get those crazy wheels to work properly! Cars are painted and decorated as desired. There is a design competition as well as a speed competition. For the race portion, each car runs 4 races....once on each of 4 colored tracks (red, blue, green, & yellow--the official AWANA colors). The cars are awarded points based on which place they arrived for each race. Those points are added together and the highest total wins the competition.
The competition consists of taking a pinewood block and cutting it and sanding it to shape it as desired. Weights must be added to get the car as close to 5 ounces as possible, without going over. The car kit comes with axels and "official" Awana Grand Prix wheels. I am pretty sure that the magic behind the whole competition is figuring out how to get those crazy wheels to work properly! Cars are painted and decorated as desired. There is a design competition as well as a speed competition. For the race portion, each car runs 4 races....once on each of 4 colored tracks (red, blue, green, & yellow--the official AWANA colors). The cars are awarded points based on which place they arrived for each race. Those points are added together and the highest total wins the competition.
This year was our family's 3rd year participating. We have no handy wood carving/car making skills whatsoever, so we learn a little more each year. The first year we participated, Jersey #1 entered a race car that never completed the race. After a few attempts, a wheel fell off completely! The 2nd year, our oldest 3 kids each entered a car. Our goal was to finish the race with the wheels intact. All of the cars took last place in all of their races, except for a 3rd place score once. We considered that a drastic improvement! The Referee actually had to drill out a bit of the wood block on Jersey #3's "train" car, because he had added so much paint, it took the car over the allowed weight limit!
Paint. Oh Joy! Our kids think that painting and decorating their cars is the most exciting part of the event. According to the rules, the clubber (the kid enrolled in AWANA) is suppose to do the sanding and the painting of their cars. Parents are allowed to help with the wood cutting and the wheels. It became quite clear to us that first year, that there were some cars that were never touched by a child! Some of the designs and paintings were quite gorgeous, and clearly the work of a very excited (competitive) parent.
Our family attends the workshop where folks with the tools and knowledge assist us in building the cars. Each year, we learn more and require less assistance. I am not sure how many years it will take before we are confident enough to buy some of the tools for our home! We have the kids pick out which design they would like for their cars, and the older kids help trace out their design in pencil on the wood block. The Referee cuts the cars into their shape with the help of the workshop tools and assistants. The kids sand their cars (very little, because they find that job to be quite boring).
I have the pleasure of supervising the painting part at home. This year, I felt brave enough to advance a little from washable paints applied with brushes, to spraypaint. We went outside in the afternoon and I attempted to teach each of the older 3 kids how to paint their car with spraypaint. They had a blast!
Paint. Oh Joy! Our kids think that painting and decorating their cars is the most exciting part of the event. According to the rules, the clubber (the kid enrolled in AWANA) is suppose to do the sanding and the painting of their cars. Parents are allowed to help with the wood cutting and the wheels. It became quite clear to us that first year, that there were some cars that were never touched by a child! Some of the designs and paintings were quite gorgeous, and clearly the work of a very excited (competitive) parent.
Our family attends the workshop where folks with the tools and knowledge assist us in building the cars. Each year, we learn more and require less assistance. I am not sure how many years it will take before we are confident enough to buy some of the tools for our home! We have the kids pick out which design they would like for their cars, and the older kids help trace out their design in pencil on the wood block. The Referee cuts the cars into their shape with the help of the workshop tools and assistants. The kids sand their cars (very little, because they find that job to be quite boring).
I have the pleasure of supervising the painting part at home. This year, I felt brave enough to advance a little from washable paints applied with brushes, to spraypaint. We went outside in the afternoon and I attempted to teach each of the older 3 kids how to paint their car with spraypaint. They had a blast!
It just so happened that Jersey #4 was napping that afternoon, so I spraypainted her car instead. I am pretty sure that was for the best!
Even though spraypaint dries rather quickly, our kids thought it was torture to have to wait for the paint to dry before they could decorate their cars. I brought out stencils, markers, and stickers, and let each kids decorate their own car with their own sense of style.
Even though spraypaint dries rather quickly, our kids thought it was torture to have to wait for the paint to dry before they could decorate their cars. I brought out stencils, markers, and stickers, and let each kids decorate their own car with their own sense of style.
I added their number stickers, and superglued the weights. The Referee pounded in the axels and attached the wheels. We did not let the kids touch their cars again until race day....because we learned the hard way last year that Jersey #3 likes collisions, which really deforms those crazy wheels!
Race day was a blast. Thankfully, all of the cars made it down the track with their wheels intact. We did not have fast cars, by any stretch of the imagination!
Much to our surprise, Jersey #1 won a trophy this year. Her race car took 1st place for design, in the "truck" category. It turns out that her red truck was the only truck entered in the Sparks division. The majority of her friends made pink or purple race cars this year (with princess or Hannah Montanna themes).
Race day was a blast. Thankfully, all of the cars made it down the track with their wheels intact. We did not have fast cars, by any stretch of the imagination!
Much to our surprise, Jersey #1 won a trophy this year. Her race car took 1st place for design, in the "truck" category. It turns out that her red truck was the only truck entered in the Sparks division. The majority of her friends made pink or purple race cars this year (with princess or Hannah Montanna themes).
Jersey #1 made a red pick-up truck. She drew a Christmas tree on the truck bed, as if it were hauling a tree.
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