Horse Sculpture Wins Kinetic Race

A team from Northern California who piloted a large winged horse was crowned the overall grand champion of the city’s third annual Kinetic Sculpture Race on Sunday.

June Moxon of Eureka and Holly Hosterman of Arcata won the top prize for their attitudes, engineering and the overall artistic flare of their sculpture, “Sparkle, A Horse of a Different Color.”

“It’s a lot of people getting together and having fun and being silly,” said Jeff Taggart, a judge who came from Anchorage for the event. “This gives everybody a good reason to do that.”

The race involves maneuvering strange-looking, people-powered vehicles through mud, sand, road and water.

Twenty-one teams competed in the two-day event. Other winners included: First place for speed went to “Wild Blue Yonder”; first place for engineering went to “Drum Roll;” and “Sparkle” won first place for art.

The 12-mile race wrapped up with a barbecue and awards ceremony in the grassy area at the end of Figueroa Street near Surfers Point.

The race started Saturday at the corner of Main and California streets with the firing of a cannon. Participants first had to skip down California Street to their waiting vehicles.

The vehicles went north on Main through town to the bike path, just before the bridge at the Ventura River. The race then followed the bike path toward the pier area, where entrants had to maneuver over a large mound of sand before continuing to Martha’s Vineyard Court.

On Sunday the participants gathered at a vacant lot by the Sheraton, which was transformed into a huge mud pit that each vehicle had to plow through. Next, they had to propel through water in the harbor before exiting at Harbor Cove and retracing their route of the previous day.