The History of the Cardboard Regatta

Three summers ago I experienced my first Cardboard Regatta. We had at least two weeks to put our boats together. Our only resources were cardboard, duct tape, and the engineers in our ward. We came up with some pretty good stuff! Our first summer we only had one boat to race against and we won, without a doubt.

Cardboard Regatta 2007
48th Ward

My first cardboard boat




Getting ready to launch. My boat was the far one.




Paddling in for the win.

We had another regatta just a year later with the same ward, same resources. This boat was built even sturdier. We didn't have another ward to race against so we raced against some fellow wardies in an inflatable raft.

Cardboard Regatta 2008
48th Ward

Our sturdy structure

Ready to launch

Paddling to the other side

This year we had duct tape and cardboard. No engineers and not nearly as much time. We were split into four groups and were expected to construct a cardboard boat within a couple of hours. We were without engineers in our group and so we were left to our own experience, which was limited. I didn't have anything to do with the designs of the boats from the last two years and I couldn't even remember what they had looked like. We sure didn't come up with much.

Cardboard Regatta 2009
16th Ward

Our poorly designed boat/raft.
We did layer the bottom with LOTS of cardboard but it still didn't do much for us.

For some strange reason (probably because people are nice), Andrea and I had been receiving lots of compliments on our boat (more like a raft) and were feeling pretty confident about this race.

Our original plan for the win: I would paddle and she would be the motor.




Our plan quickly failed.




We resorted to my pulling the front while doing the side stroke and Andrea still being the motor.

When I could finally touch, we just pulled the boat to shore.

Needless to say, we came in last. But we finished! So I hyperventilated half of my way across first dam. Not only was my body working harder than normal, but I was trying to breathe in freezing cold water. My lungs were definitely not pleased with me. I wanted to quit but Andrea wouldn't have it! We actually came up with a great gospel parallel but that's for another day.

My favorite part is that as we were leaving the house before the race Andrea asked if we were going to get wet. "No!" I said, almost insulted. "We'll be totally fine. I've done this for two years and stayed completely dry." Whoops!

Completely soaked

The moral of the story: have engineers in your group and give yourselves a little more than a couple of hours to complete your project. Oh, and a motivator like Andrea.