In the world of Cub Scouting, is there anything bigger than Pinewood Derby? I think not!

Browsing around The Art of Manliness website (cool site, BTW), I saw their post on “How To Build a Pinewood Derby Car“. It brought up memories, both old and recent.

As a Kid

When I was a Cub Scout, Pinewood Derby was THE event of the year. I remember working with my Dad, building the car, but the performance was horrible. So the next year we tried again. Now we did note that we never got the built-weight up to the 5.0 ounce limit, so they were always taping pennies onto our car… which blew the way it looked and it still didn’t perform all that well.

Little did I know how much Dad was paying attention.

My third year at it my Dad got serious. We made a different design, putting more weight into the car and towards the back. The wood block was cut in a wedge design with very little wood up front (in front of the “drivers slot”). Then I recall we dug around in the junk buckets in at the workbench to find weight that would work, such as a large nut. We drilled out holes in the bottom of the car and puttied the weights in there. One thing I was particularly proud of at the time was while Dad was at work I was digging for more weights and found this dome-shaped hunk of metal. I took the hacksaw to the post it was on, stuck it into the “drivers slot” and then painted it. It looked just like a driver with his helmet and goggles all hunkered down behind the wheel. I thought that was so cool (I wish I still had the car and could show a picture here). I just remember thinking how cool and clever I was, because it was functional but also artistic. 🙂

We worked hard to make that great racer and I remember coming in third place. I also remember that I actually came in first place, but the Dad’s manning the finish line didn’t get things right and the one Dad that recovered my car didn’t speak up so I just got shoved into 3rd place. Oh well, it didn’t bother me much because in the end I was just happy to have made a car that worked well — and did it with my Dad.

As an Adult

So then my sons do Cub Scouts. Pinewood Derby in our Pack was different. They opted to do away with “first, second, third” place finishing and so on. Why? Because it had gotten out of hand. Apparently the year before I joined the Pack, they had some incident where some Dad was outside yelling at the Pack leaders, threatening to sue, and just generally going stupid about the whole thing. As volunteers, the leadership didn’t need nor want the grief, so they just did away with it — it was no longer a competition, it was an “exhibition” race. Part of me did not like that because it just reeked of the wussification of America, because well… learning how to deal with loss and learning how to be a gracious and humble winner is very much a part of life and character building to become a well-adjusted adult. But by the same token, I could totally understand not wanting all the hell and hassle. And as one leader pointed out to me, it didn’t really matter. In the end, the kids all know who has the fastest car, who has the coolest car, they’ll still cry if their car doesn’t do well, you’ll still have one kid that needs to learn what “gracious winner” is, and so on. So in the end, the dynamics really remain.

Plus, it got rid of the micromanagement of rules, and I think it also encouraged more “let the boy do the work”. Since Dad didn’t have to go nuts trying to over-engineer the car, we didn’t sweat things too much. Sure we encouraged everyone to follow the rules, to mind some level of guidelines so things didn’t get stupid, but hey, if someone wanted to go full-stupid they could, but to what gain or end? I think in the end it generally worked out better for the boys.

Because….

In reading that Art of Manliness article, the article itself was pretty straightforward and had reasonable tips. Back before the Internet, you had to learn these things and pass these coveted secrets down. But now, just a Google search away. Then as I read some of the comments, it just bothered me the level to which some of these Dads went with things. But then, that’s them, that’s not me, and in the end that’s OK.

I couldn’t comment on the article since it’s old and comments were closed, but after reading through it all I could only think of one thing:

What do you want to teach your son?

If you want to teach him about engineering, friction, physics, and so on? Sure, over-engineer the daylights out of it! In fact, if you’re in to Scouts for the long haul, plan the lesson over the course of his entire Cub Scout career, letting the first year perhaps be a loser year, then doing it better each year so he can see first-hand how it all works and goes. That’s a lot of long-term planning, but could be a bigger and better life lesson.

Do you want to teach them about winning and losing? About competition? About sportsmanship? About wood working?

In the end, you have to remember: this is for him, not you (and yes, suggestions of having a “Dad’s Race” or “Open Class” are good ways for leaders, siblings, and over-achieving Dads to have THEIR fun). Figure out what you want him to get out of it, then pursue that goal. Scouting is about building character, developing leaders. Work to help your son towards that end.

Thanx, Dad. 🙂