Arkansas, what is it famous for? Perhaps its natural beauty and numerous state parks. Perhaps it’s famous for a certain president who like to “mess around.” Maybe it’s for the World Championship Cardboard Boat Races.
Wait… what? Yes, you heard me right folks, Arkansas is home to the World Championship of the sport of racing boats carefully crafted of cardboard, duct tape, liquid nails, and deck and patio sealer. Hang on, you’re thinking. Cardboard boats? Yes, cardboard boats.
Why would I know this, you may be thinking. It’s because the event was held last Saturday and I went, for the second year in a row.
Yes, in the quaint little town of Heber Springs, Arkansas, on the shores of Greer’s Ferry Lake, a competition the likes of which would probably make you think, “Why?” is held annually at Sandy Beaches State Park. And this is not something new. This competition was in it’s twenty-first year. Twenty-one years, people!
You may also ask, “Why the heck were you at such a thing?” Well, one of my friend’s family has been building cardboard boats for this competition the past four years and last year, he invited me to go with them. I was invited back again this year, and I agreed again. Because if you think about it, what’s a better use of a Saturday afternoon than either racing or watching people race in precariously-built boats of cardboard origin? I mean, seriously.
The “base camp” for this operation is my friend’s “game room,” a separate addition to the house which includes a lower area with a basketball goal that can also be used for soccer, badminton, and other sports activities, and an upper “nook” area that is used for Lego creations and Xbox and Gamecube fun. Over the summer, one could walk in the game room and see random people working on their cardboard boats. Yes boats. As in, more than one. This year, our team (curiously named “Team Flower Power”. The origin of the name eludes me, but I believe it’s because the original entrants four years ago were Will’s sister and her friend, who had a flower-emblazoned boat) entered five boats in various divisions. Now, this is not as though these boats are built in a day or two, or even a weekend or two. No, this is a very detailed process from start to finish that took them (about seven people) nearly two months to complete. Granted, they didn’t work on this nonstop. Most time on these boats was spent during the weekends up until the race.
Now, what, you may ask, goes into a cardboard boat? First, obviously, is cardboard. Lots and lots of cardboard. My friend’s dad has a friend who works at International Paper, so he was able to obtain quite a supply of cardboard for free (two truckbeds full of sheets of cardboard, if I recall correctly), because the cardboard wasn’t “up to industry standards” or something like that. Now, just because it isn’t up to industry standards doesn’t mean it’s totally bad. In fact, if you didn’t know so, you’d probably think that is was perfect sheets of the board. Now, onto the construction. To begin, you glue multiple sheets of cardboard to create thick layers of cardboard for the hull. After the hull is complete, you must waterproof the cardboard. There are two main methods to do this. First, and most importantly, you surround the exposed edges of cardboard with duct tape. Now you may not believe me, but cardboard is actually pretty waterproof. The main problem with cardboard is that if water is allowed to get between the two “outside” layers (into the “waffles”, or corrugation), it basically becomes extremely heavy with water, and ruins the seaworthiness of the board. If you cover the edges with duct tape, however, the rate of water absorption is quite lower. However, duct tape alone is not enough. To fully water proof it, you must apply some sort of water-proofing sealer (much like you use for a deck or patio) to the areas not protected by the duct tape.
After the edges are sealed, and the surface coated with as many as four coats of sealer, you can begin to assemble your boat in the desired design (you may also assemble the boat before sealing, if desired). Most people use liquid nails to attach the pieces together (caulk is outlawed against use in the competition, but Liquid Nails are acceptable) and then cover all the corners with more duct tape. After the pieces are finally assembled into the desired shape, you may then apply a last coat of sealer.
Also needed is some means of propelling the boat in the water. For this, there are two divisions of races (both of which are further divided into two categories: youth and adult). The first is the mechanical division. In this division, you are not allowed to use any paddles. You must have some mechanism to propel your boat, such as paddle wheels, propellers, etc. However, you may not use some sort of motor to power your boat. It must be all human-powered. In the non-mechanical division, you must use paddles to propel your boat.
And this is not some wily-nilly hobbyist competition. This is governed by strict rules in regards to weight, propulsion system, and even the amount of duct tape allowed in the first heat (after the first heat, the judges do not care if you make repairs using duct tape, in fact, you can use as much duct tape as needed to keep your boat afloat for the second heat). If the judges believe that your boat is not entirely made of cardboard, they can take an icepick and poke a hole through your boat to test.
Now, about the competition. I was extremely surprised at how many people actually showed up at this. Not only that, they held a competition last year to see who had come the farthest to see the farthest to attend this competition. They announced people from Mississippi (not too far), California (a little farther), Japan (umm… why?), and Korea (again, why… if they come to the States, is there not anything more exciting you can come see than the World Championships of Cardboard Boat racing?). [As a side note, the World Championship Watermelon Eating contest is held at this beach on the same day.] And this just wasn’t my friend’s family that went for our team. This year, the team expanded a bit, as a lot of our friends from the dorm came along to help us not only with the competition, but the actual construction of the boat. As I said earlier, we entered five boats in four different divisions.
The actual races are arranged in two heats, with you facing one (possibly two) other boat in the channel with you. For the race, a line of buoys are arranged into a small arc from one part of the harbor to the another, reaching about a quarter of a mile. While you do have another boat in the channel with you, your real opponent is the clock, as the tournament placement is based on your average time from both heats.
The team I was on, The Four Oarsmen of the Apocalypse didn’t do so well in our first heat, as our paddle wheels broke. So, we decided to jump off the boat and swim it in. The second heat, we switched to regular paddles (due a technicality that we had a rudder, we were still allowed in the mechanical division with regular paddles), and we did a lot better, but still not enough to win our division. However, it was in the demolition derby that we shined. During the derby, we expanded to “The Six Oarsmen” (we added two of the other people who helped to build the boat, one who lived in our dorm, and the other we’ve known since High School). The rules for the Derby changed this year, and once you were out of the boat, you were out for good (before, if you hurried, you could get back into the boat), which changed it up a bit. We had a truce with the other Flower Power boat that was in the derby to not flip each other until the very end, which meant that one of us was going to win. In the end, it was us against them, and we were able to pull the other team off their boat without any losses on our part. After the victory, some of us commandeered the other boat. :D
After the derby was the awards ceremony, where we got two trophies, one for Children’s Mechanical division, and one for the demolition derby. We loaded the boats back into the trailer we have for the purpose (it’s a racing trailer that one of the team members owns), and left for home. Afterwards, there was Xbox Live fun and pizza. It was a pretty amazing day.
Now, if you didn’t believe that cardboard boat racing was serious business enough before, then you might be surprised that the Smithsonian did a documentary on it. Our team was pretty prominent in there (I assume, they haven’t released it yet [obviously, it’s only been a week], but they took a lot of footage of us the day before and the day of the competition). I’m actually kind of excited about seeing that. Apparently, the documentary is one of the first that will be featured on a new television network that the Smithsonian is launching, and that they are going to feature a “viral advertisement” network… I’ll have to see how that works out. :P
Basically, that’s it for the description of the event. If you want to see some pictures of the event (there’ll be a crap load, so I’m not putting them on front page so that people’s internet won’t die :P), click the “Read More” link.
Construction
Humble Beginnings
Seal ‘er up!
The business end of the brush came off, so one of the builders took it in his hands and brushed it “manually”.
One layer complete!
The beginnings of “Brunhilda, Sea Goddess of Death.”
Forked tongue action.
The completed Brunhilda, and an almost complete boat. Notice the hawt wood-grain action.
Competition
Coming in for a landing after the first race. Notice the pirate boat in the back. It was built of wood, so wasn’t in the races, but it was still pretty neat.
lolpeople. In the back, you can see the Apocalypse and the Oarsmen celebrating our win in the Demolition Derby.
Two of the boats we destroyed.
Another Team’s Boat
This is the reason we didn’t win best design. It did a lot better in the race than I imagined, too. Apparently, they spent six months on it, so I guess they deserved the award. :P
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