Twenty-four teams. Five weeks of preparation. One winner.
On Saturday, June 6, Red Bull will host its Chariot Race on the University of Oregon campus. Twenty-four teams of four will have the chance to compete for the prize for first place: $1,500 in cash and 60 cases of 8.4oz cans of Red Bull. The team who lands second place will receive a “One-of-a-kind Red Bull experience,” and, in third, a “Red Bull Party experience.”
The event will begin with a short opening ceremony at 2 p.m., followed by 30-second skits performed by each team. Afterwards, the race will begin, starting on the Memorial Quad and circuiting through East 13th Avenue. At the track’s halfway point, teams will be required to complete a puzzle before switching out their riders. They must execute a successful run of the rest of the course with their handmade chariots, and winners will be announced during the award ceremony at 4:30 p.m.
One team has already made a name for themselves from their growing Instagram presence, with one video alone receiving more than 150,000 likes. The Eugene Eaters, composed of Drew Lincoln, Eli Watnick-Wizeman, Miles Wood and Josh Flannery, are nothing if not prepared, seemingly always in the middle of a test run while wearing matching sweatbands.
The group met through mutual friends and the UO Climbing Team, of which Lincoln, a sophomore, is a current member. When Watnick-Wizeman, a junior, learned of the competition, he knew they would make a perfect team.
“I was scrolling the ‘gram one time and then I saw The Nest post it, and then I sent it to Miles immediately and I was like, ‘We have to do this.’ Like, no way we’re not doing this,” Watnick-Wizeman said. “This is our calling, basically. It’s perfect.”
Lincoln described Watnick-Wizeman and Wood as “Eugene’s Phineas and Ferb,” and after taking one look at their home, the comparison makes perfect sense. There are various contraptions, parts to bicycles and a heap of funky knickknacks thoughtfully splayed around the front yard.
Each member adds something deliberately unique to the team. Wood is a professional welder and works in UO Outdoor Program’s Bike Shop. Flannery is a professional chef, Lincoln is a rock climber and Watnick-Wizeman is a “jack of all trades,” acting as the Eaters’ “maintenance man.”
“It’s nice having four people because we do have those opposing ideas, you know what I’m saying? But usually we’re able to kind of take something from each of us and kind of bring it into like a really good solid idea that we have,” Flannery said.
They claim none of them are particularly perfectionists, and collaborative brainstorming has been the key to creating a chariot that is both functional and showcases a bit of their personalities.
“(There have been) A lot of long nights. We’ve been building our chariot out of a side by side tandem that we cut in half with a hand saw. And then we’re kind of building that into a giant pot because we’re the Eugene Eaters. So, we’re all chef-themed. Two of us are gonna be chefs, two of us are gonna be rats. And then we’ve been training in various ways. We’ve been testing our mental strength against the cannons and against the highest slack line. And then we’ve been training our muscles in various ways, and our stamina,” Lincoln said.
The “Ratatouille”-esque theme came about after the group had acquired a four-foot-tall fork and spoon they found on Facebook Marketplace. Conveniently, they obtained a giant whisk that same week, and knew they had to use whatever props they had at their disposal.
Despite their moments of social media virality, the Eaters say that the most important thing is that people show up and enjoy themselves this Saturday, even if they don’t win first place. “The views are one thing, but it’s also fire being able to spread awareness for the actual event, and then hopefully being able to do more events like this in the future with everyone,” Flannery said.
“Yeah, we knew we trained our hardest at least,” Lincoln said.
Teams are scored comprehensively based on their skit, chariot design, creativity and time taken to complete the race. The speed at which a team completes the track will be heavily considered, but the multiple elements make for a layered competition.
Charlie Wall and Sage Gassert, both juniors, met when they became roommates their freshman year. Along with Eero Lee and Korbin Martinez, they make up the Goblins; a competing team inspired by the mischievous mythical creature. Goblins have been a sort of inside joke for Wall and Gassert since that year, and when they first started brainstorming chariot themes, they were inspired by the folklore and various fantasy elements.
As for executing this particular theme, Wall said, “Our plan is to go to a bunch of like junkyards and recycling centers and use that. We want it to be kind of like an amalgamation.” Although Wall is a product design major, and knows his way around the Millrace Woodshop, he wanted to include his teammates and have enough space to have fun with the design.
Buying materials from Home Depot could get expensive, so rummaging through a junkyard seemed like more of a suitable option to the team. And it matches the goblin vibe fairly well.
“Like how goblins usually get around is like some sort of like sticks and staples-like vehicles,” Gassert said. “We kind of want to emulate that feeling. Like, it looks like it’s about to fall apart, but it won’t.”
They are nothing if not dedicated to their theme. Wall has already created an audio snippet for the competition’s skit section, complete with goblin-like chanting. They may also paint themselves green, which they hope is a level of commitment that may tip the judge’s scales in their favor.
Wall’s greatest concern is the structure of the chariot, specifically the wheels, which need to be strong enough to sustain the craft for a race through campus. The challenge is apparent in “actually turning and the mechanics of it, but also actually sourcing and finding wheels,” Wall said. Gassert agreed, although he has the right amount of confidence anyone would need for a competition like this one.
“It’ll work out. That’s kind of our philosophy,” Gassert said. None of the teams know what the course is going to look like. Red Bull’s official rule guide states that there will be “obstacles” and “challenges along the way” that teams will have to navigate, so a strong collaborative mindset and creative problem-solving skills may be the key to making it on the podium.
The chariot race is open to the public at no cost, and there will be an after-party taking place at Rennie’s Landing at 5 p.m.
