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Saturday's Culpeper Soap Box Derby is World's Biggest
The Soap Box Derby of Culpeper will be taking a big step forward with this Saturday's race, months after having taken a big step back with a loss of one of its own.
With a jump in the number of racers from 128 to 153 this year, organizers say the Culpeper-hosted event will be the biggest Soap Box Derby in the world, surpassing the 151 who recently raced in Fredericksburg.
But it will also be losing Carol Anne Brown, a former Culpeper resident who drove in the event and also founded the derby's junior competition committee.
The 18-year-old committed suicide this past Easter and this year's race is being run in her memory, with the trophy for sportsmanship, which Brown had won, being renamed in her honor.
“We've lost her, but we're keeping her memory alive,” said race director Frankie Gilmore. “She was an amazing young lady, and if by doing that, we can save another child from depression or bipolarism, it will help.”
“It's hard for us,” said derby committee member Thom Pellikaan. “We loved her.”
The derby that Brown had been with since its inception in 2003 has grown from 35 drivers to 153 in just six years, with Culpeper County this year having the greatest chance, numbers-wise, of sending a racer to the All-American Soap Box Derby World Championships in Akron on July 25.
But interest has grown exponentially in adjacent counties, with Rappahannock County fielding an all-time high 13 racers this year. Fauquier County has four entries.
One excited driver is 11-year-old county straddler Shane O'Heir, who lives in Boston, Va., but is racing a car for The Inn of Little Washington, where his father Neil works.
“It's really fun just going down in the car and stuff like that,” said O'Heir last Saturday as his car was being prepared for inspection.
O'Heir was eliminated in the first round last year, his first in the derby, but this year there will be a competition within the competition, as Shane's older brother, Michael, is making his debut in the race.
Both are students at Wakefield Country Day School, but not a whole lot of study is required to make a go of it at this race.
“It's basically screwing nuts in — it's not that hard,” said Michael of the car kits, which currently run upward of $430 on the All-American Soap Box Derby Web site. “And they have clinics, so anything you're having a problem with, they can come and help you.”
For area drivers, the racing season began on Feb. 22 with a clinic hosted by Rosson and Troillo Motor Company, which has locations in Culpeper and Fauquier counties. Since then, the racers have had four clinics, a spring rally race, a trial run (for first-time drivers), and last weekend's inspection to get their gravity-powered cars ready for the derby's 650-foot course...
See the Wednesday print edition of the Fauquier Times-Democrat for the complete story.
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