Pinewood Derby Cars – Cub Scouts Sportsmanship

Sportsmanship is important in every competition…including pinewood derby car racing. What does sportsmanship mean? Sportsmanship is simply your behavior (or reaction) when you win or lose.

I always tried in instill good sportsmanship in my son by making the following statement before every race, “Remember, win or lose, we did our best. And doing your best is the most important thing.”

The important thing is to have fun on the journey and to follow the cub scout motto, “do your best ”.

I have an interesting story that demonstrates pinewood derby sportsmanship. One year when I was managing our pinewood derby race for our Cub Scout Pack, a boy handed me his car during the weigh-in that shocked me. The wheels were cut in half vertically and each wheel had five large holes drilled through them from the side to make them lighter.

The axles were machined rods that went through the entire block. They were not even pinewood derby axles . Pre-cut cars , polished axles and wheels that have been “cleaned up” with light lathing were fine, even expected for serious racers, but this car was patently illegal using any interpretation of the derby rules.

Unfortunately, the person submitting the car was none other than my son’s best friend! I called over his father and said that these modifications were not allowed. He argued with me (in a nice way) saying that the rules were not specific enough to say he couldn’t cut the wheels in half! I was shocked. This was incredible.

I took a closer look at the car to see if there was something I could do. I could ask him to change the wheels. Problem was the rods went deep into the block and were permanently glued. They were not coming out.

What should I do? I was the pinewood derby race manager …I had to decide.

Should I disqualify the car and send this boy home? I’ve never disqualified a car because no one ever grossly violated the rules . So I thought - who has the most to lose??? It would be the second place winner. Well, guess who was the first place winner two years running? My son! If I allowed this illegal car, surely my son would lose his first place streak.

I talked it over with my pinewood derby race management team. We all knew the car was illegal but no one wanted to make the final decision to toss this car out.

It was up to me and my son had the most to lose!