Concrete Canoe Team victorious!
 he UW-Madison Concrete
Canoe Team dominated the 30th annual Dutch Concrete Canoe Challenge
this weekend in the Netherlands. The team took first place overall,
with victories in five out of the six race categories. The team’s
20-foot, 176-pound canoe, Descendent, also
won the construction and innovation categories for its design and use
of environmentally sound concrete.
Eight members of the UW-Madison team and their adviser,
Associate Professor Chin
Wu, traveled to Amsterdam for the competition, also known as the
Beton Kano Race, which ran from Sept. 7 to 9. The team was invited to
compete after winning the U.S. national championship for the fifth consecutive
time in June. The UW-Madison team was one of 12 participating teams,
most of which hailed from the Netherlands or Germany.
The American Concrete Institute (ACI) and the American Society of Civil
Engineers (ASCE) paid the UW team’s trip expenses to the race.
UW-Madison College of Engineering Associate Dean
Steve
Cramer, a professor of civil and environmental engineering, was
the team’s 2007 faculty advisor. “It’s a well-deserved
trip,” he says. “The team was closely knit and very committed.
They worked hard.”
The competition is an opportunity to remind all students that engineering
has become a global field, says Cramer. “It’s important
that as many students get international experience as possible,”
he says. “The success of these students has provided them the
chance to gain global experience.”
Canoe team project manager David Blodgett, a senior civil and environmental
engineering student, says the team “couldn’t be happier”
with the competition results. “We owe a big thank-you to ASCE
and ACI for funding the trip and being so amazing in helping us get
there,” he says.
Blodgett said the races were very physical, describing
the men’s sprint in particular as a “true battle.”
At the start of race day, he thought the day was sure to be full of
“concrete canoe carnage.”
The sprint races were held in a narrow canal with overhead bridges,
according to Blodgett. He says the 20 or more European canoes would
have been solid contenders in the Great Lakes Regional Conference, but
the UW-Madison team was able to pull off decisive victories.
The physicality of the races took its toll on Descendent.
After a “brutal T-bone” in the co-ed race, Blodgett says
the boat appeared to flex at least four inches and some decorative concrete
actually broke off the canoe.
“Our canoe sustained a large amount of aesthetic damage, but structurally,
it faired beautifully,” he says.
Overall, Blodgett said it was a “great pleasure” to be part
of the competition. He also said the canoe team experience in general
was positive. “I've gained a lot of experience as a leader in
terms of motivating and teaching people of all skill levels and backgrounds,”
he says.
The actual race wasn’t the only event of the trip. Blodgett and
team member Ivy Harmon, a fellow civil and environmental engineering
student, traveled to the Netherlands a week prior to the competition
to spend time sight-seeing. They toured Delft Hydraulics, which the
U.S. Congress has consulted on flood protection issues. Blodgett says
seeing the latest research in sediment transport, fluid mechanics and
water wave theory was “really amazing stuff.”
The eight members who traveled to the Netherlands will be able to share
the experience with their teammates and the student body as a whole,
says Cramer. “It will open everybody’s eyes to a larger
world,” he says.
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