OT - U-M Hosting Steel Bridge/Concrete Canoe Competition This Weekend
Just wanna bring to your attention that U-M is hosting the annual regional Steel Bridge and Concrete Canoe competition this year. Our regional is the North Central region and our competitors are MSU, Michigan Tech, Wayne State, Toledo, Ohio Northern, U of D, WMU, and Lawrence Tech.
Saturday's festivities go from 9 am til 5 pm at Pierpont and Duderstadt buildings on north campus. The steel bridge competition (UMich steel bridge won last year's regional and went to nationals) starts around 10:30 am and the concrete canoes will be on display and have their presentations starting around 2.
Sunday is concrete canoe race day up at Independence Lake, in Webster (a good 10 minute drive up US-23 from campus). Canoe races start at 9 and are the men's endurance, men's sprint, women's endurance, women's sprints, and co-ed sprint.
If you live in the area and have nothing to do this weekend, come check out this cool competition.
Canoe website - http://umich.edu/~concanoe
Steel Bridge website - http://www.engin.umich.edu/societies/sbt/
Competition website - http://www.umich.edu/~asce/NCRC.html
March 31st, 2011 at 11:47 AM ^
Not all Engineers are Civil!
March 31st, 2011 at 11:48 AM ^
Psh, I call BS. Concrete doesn't float. I'll bet Charlie Sheen and his warlock buddies could make it happen though.
March 31st, 2011 at 12:11 PM ^
Hope the lake authorities don't mind about 8 canoes at the bottom haha.
But srs, we design our own concrete mix and we can get it to be less dense than water, thus getting it to float. It's a paradox, but we own it.
March 31st, 2011 at 12:21 PM ^
Very cool. Good luck!
March 31st, 2011 at 12:14 PM ^
I was a member of the '93 concrete canoe team. Looks like they have gotten a little more sophisticated over the years.
March 31st, 2011 at 12:49 PM ^
One of the more amusing times was serving as a life guard for the concrete canoe race in Houghton Michigan. Imagine if you will a lake full of engineers who go to MTU, spent the entire winter indoors eating junk food and failing to exercise. These engineers are now in a canoe that is rapidly sinking into the center of the the lake. Even better is when the canoe fails catastrophically, such as cracking in half and just dumps them in the water without warning. If anyone is in town I strongly recommend going to see the race.
I live 5 hours away and I may now drive up just to see this happen. The laughs would be so worth it.
North Campus represent!
I bet fording the Huron is a nightmare. How many people does it take to lift one?
I did the Steel Bridge 3 years ago for Lawrence Tech. We came out victorious, Michigans bridge that year was DQ'd, they couldnt put it together legally. Sadly, Nationals was at UF that year, finally get a paid trip and its a place almost everyone has been to, Florida, and this was in May so it was sick nasty hot.
Would you judge this to be a good event for a nerdy kid? I'd be inclined to come with my offspring.
If your a nerd you will love this. I dont know how interested the kids will be, its like watching a bunch of college kids put together a giant erector set. The canoe part is like watching a crew team except everyone is paddling in a different direction cause they're boat may not be perfect. Sometimes its just funny to see some times look like they are trying to row a CMU block.
I sh*t you not, the MSU concrete canoe team misspelled "university" on their canoe.
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<br>There is nothing more to say.
I have one crappy iPhone photo. It was too crowded to get a photo that got the whole canoe. But you get the idea. Oh, Sparty. Always true to type.
<img src="http://www.flickr.com/photos/cranky_mich/5584105302/">
Gawd, I must have a little sparty blood in me because apparently I can't embed properly.
Link's broken. How did they TRY to spell "university"?
sorry, not sure how I loused it up.
The canoe is stenciled with "Michigan State Univeristy."
Perhaps someone can track down some photos from the actual race after it takes place tomorrow.