Grand Prix Night at Awanas!

This is the Grand Prix Arena in the New Hope Church Sanctuary. There are 2 tracks set up: one for the Sparkies (K-2 graders) and the other for the T & T's (3rd - 6th graders). There were over 100 kids and leaders racing cars this year! They give awards for speed, design, overall package and lots of other specific things like: most patriotic car (Luke's), best chunk of wood, best use of a bible verse, best OSU and UofO cars, most girly car.....anyway, you get the point. Each contestant had to make a pine derby car with certain specifications like length, width of tires and weight, but could design their cars anyway they choose. On race night, each car got to race 4 times and the combined times gave the fastest cars. It's unbelievable what goes into putting this event on! There were 65 Sparks races, 47 T&T races and 23 leaders races. Plus each of contestants got their own driver's licence with picture and the 3 big screens in the sanctuary showed all the cars (one at a time) before, during and after the event. The screens also displayed all the races and times, who was on deck for the next race and other fun information (like if someone beat the best track record). It was a fun night for everyone!!

Caitlin with her Grand Prix car named "2NZ" (tunes)

Her car took the top 7th spot of the night for speed!!
Caitlin's car is set up on the track
and ready to roll!
(her's is the grey metallic car
on the yellow track with music notes)
Luke with his Grand Prix Car named "Flag Runner"

Luke's name on the big screen getting ready for a race.

Luke's car is the red, white and blue one on the yellow track!

This was such a fun experience for Mike and the kids to share.

They would go out to the shop for hours to cut, sand, paint and design!

Mike learned a lot at the races about how to help speed up the cars,

but his ideas will have to wait until next year's Grand Prix!!