SALISBURY — Last Wednesday, June 8, a sunny evening at Branbury Beach on Lake Dunmore, some 60 Middlebury Union High School near-graduates entered 15 craft of various degrees of seaworthiness into the senior raft race.

Each team was given four 55-gallon drums with which to construct a raft. On vessels sporting names such as “Usain Boat,” “The Big Dripper” and “Ship for Brains” the celebrating teens plowed into the water.

HANNAH TURNER AND Zoe Noble propel “The Friend Ship” to an early round victory over the “Red Rocket” in a time trial at the Senior Raft Race last week. Photo by Joe McVeigh

After initial time trials and a pair of semi-finals, the two fastest teams took to the water for the finals. It was a furious race, the boys taking off at speed, but the girls keeping right up. A collision at the turning buoy slowed both rafts, but the boys on “Do It For Luke” appeared to have the victory.

AFTER AN ATTEMPT in an earlier heat of the raft race proved unsuccessful, Henry Swan experiments with a new form of propulsion. He did not win the competition.
Photo by Joe McVeigh

However the Rules Committee maintained that the boys in “Do It For Luke” had failed to make the turn around the final buoy. But the committee also ruled that the girls in “The Friend Ship” had obstructed the opposing raft.

In a self-described “spineless decision,” Rules Committee Chair Sean Farrell declared both boats Co-Champions!

ZORA DUQUETTE-HOFFMAN, Holly Staats and Sasha Meyers sink into the lake as they find their substitute vessel less than seaworthy. Their original entry, made of recycled insulation materials, was ruled ineligible to race because of concerns about the Styrofoam content.

The boys of “Do It For Luke” were Noah Berg, Greg Wilhelm, Jae Davis and Henry Carpenter. The girls of “The Friend Ship” were Ivy Doran, Fairley Olson, Zoe Noble and Hannah Turner.

SENIORS HENRY CARPENTER, Jae Davis, Noah Berg and Greg Wilhelm paddle in after a blistering preliminary heat of the MUHS Senior Raft Race on June 8.

In the consolation race, the girls of “AARH” won out over the boys of “Blood, Sweat, and Cheers.” Rather than suffer an ignominious defeat, the 4th-place boys opted to go down with their ship and left the beach in water-logged formal wear.