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Publication Date: Wednesday, May 18, 2005 'Linoleum Blownapart' blows out the competition
'Linoleum Blownapart' blows out the competition
(May 18, 2005) Team builds 5-ounce bridge that supports 425 pounds.
A group of intrepid seventh-graders from the International School of the Peninsula in Palo Alto won first place in the state "Destination Imagination" competition for middle schools, held recently in Clovis.
The competition deals with solving problems involving physics and engineering.
Team members -- including Sarah Winters of Atherton and Claire Uschersohn of Menlo Park -- will go to the "global finals" May 25 to 28 at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville.
Other members are Matthew Colford, Natalie Morin, Marc Slakey, Blake Tacklind, and team manager Chris Tacklind.
The kids won the state competition by building a little bridge, weighing no more than 5 ounces, that supported hundreds of pounds of weights.
The bridge -- 30 inches long, 5.5 inches wide, and 8 inches tall -- was made from balsa (an extremely light and strong wood) and glue.
Weights used by weightlifters were stacked on the bridge.
The judges and audience were astonished, according to eyewitnesses, when the team's delicate-looking bridge withstood 425 pounds for several minutes and didn't break.
Only when one more 45-pound weight was added did the bridge break.
The team also wrote a skit -- complete with props, costumes, music and dancing -- tied to the bridge theme.
Since second grade
Calling themselves "Linoleum Blownapart" -- they say the name is the answer to the question of what happens when you drop a bomb on a French kitchen floor -- team members have been meeting most Sunday afternoons since they were in the second grade.
The Destination Imagination competition, started by a university professor in the late 1970s, encourages teamwork in imaginative and original thinking to solve thought-provoking challenges.
Thousands of students across the country, from those in kindergarten through college, compete in teams at regional competitions.
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