CAMAS — The Bathtub Bandits ran the fastest tub in town and made off with the first-place trophy during the Camas Days bathtub races on Saturday.
For the family behind the team, it’s just another year of fun and another piece of hardware to bring home.
“For like 12 years in a row, we’ve won a trophy every time,” said Triston Groth. “We’ve got like seven first-place trophies in our house.”
The bandits were one of 12 teams that went rim to rim in a street race that snaked around three road cones from the starting line and back. The tubs sloshed with nearly every step while two people pushed from behind as one slipped into the cold water and steered from within.
Between heats, firefighters refilled the tubs from a firehose and gave eager kids and a handful of adults the chance to cool off under a high arc of water sprayed above the street.
This year, not one team dumped a tub, not an easy task according to members of the second-place team, Light Brigade.
“Not tipping the bathtub was the hardest around that back-corner turn,” said Craig Schulstad.
Tanya Groth, the driver for of the Bathtub Bandits, said her secret is her experience showing horses and running the pole-bending event.
Stopping a half-full cast-iron bathtub carrying grown adult isn’t too easy, either.
In the first few heats, tub pushers ran hard right to the finish line, but their tub pilots forgot to hit the brake, which sent their watery crafts into the bystanders, knocking one person out of her chair. In future heats, a few people lined up to help catch the tubs before they ran off course.
Later on in the event, two teams locked in a particularly close race met with a bang in the one and only tub-on-tub collision as they rounded the third cone.
During races, the winning team wasn’t always the fastest one. The key to victory was keeping all three cones upright before crossing the finish line — that was easier said than done for many in the race who tried to run a tight slalom.
According to reporting by the Camas Post-Record, bathtub races were started by some Washougal friends back in the 1970s. The tradition was quickly adopted as a staple event of the annual Camas Days festivities. For about the last 15 years, it’s been operated by the people behind Lutz Hardware.
Craig Schulstad, of the Light Brigade, said they had been talking about doing the event for years; after literally signing up at the last minute, the event did not disappoint.
“I think it beat our expectations,” he said.
