Teams

Shooting Fish In A Barrel

Garage Headquarters: Thornton, CO

Driver: Don Clark

Mechanics: Leo Lesperance, Andres Madrigal, John Delier

Nuts and Bolts:

People of the Denver area, you could do worse than cozying up to a team called Shooting Fish in a Barrel at the Red Bull Soapbox Race. Their driver, Don Clark, explains, “It is not below us to offer bribes to the crowd to encourage them to vote for us.” Not that Don advocates cheating, you understand. He’s just sayin’…

Don and his cohorts John Delier, Leo Lesperance, and Andres Madrigal handle various engineering functions for window treatment and covering manufacturer Hunter Douglas. Off the job, they individually participate in hobbies like ice hockey and building entries for the famous Boulder Kinetics Race, in which seemingly normal people choose to drive human-powered vehicles in outrageous costumes. (In other words, these teammates already have plenty of experience with bumps, bruises, and general public foolishness.) Now, with their soapbox car, they’ll be taking their penchant for speedy sports to a new level – via one very steep course at Red Rocks Park. The body of the team’s racer, being assembled at Don’s house in Thornton, is composed of two 55-gallon barrels held together by aluminum tubing; and dual-caliper brakes will (hopefully) give the driver the control he needs to avoid careening into a rock formation…or the judges. “I think we will win,” Don states assuredly. “Our biggest challenge isn’t the construction – it’s coming up with the thirty-second skit!”