David Moore and Teddy Smyth, both 13 years old, plopped down on the floor in Alumni Hall gym at Gordon College and again checked their car before handing it to officials to be impounded.

The seventh grade students at Davidson Fine Arts School in Augusta wanted to make sure everything was in working order before the start of the Wheeled Vehicle event during Gordon’s annual hosting of regional competition in the national Science Olympiad, which was held on Feb. 18.

Sixth- through ninth-grade public, private and home-school students competed for points at the Barnesville school. Victory went to those who had received the fewest points.

Smyth picked up the vehicle, which was about 18 inches long, and adjusted the motor – the rubber bands that propelled it – one more time. This was the team’s first year at the Olympiad, Smyth said, and they thought they would do well.

But before he turned the car over to the officials to hold until the start of the competition, which began at 9 a.m., Smyth and Moore talked strategy. To win, they had to submit the best estimate of the time it would take their vehicle to travel a certain distance.

Students hoped to do well for their school – which could receive one of the tall, shinny trophies that were awarded – and for their teams. Team winners received medals to be worn like the ones athletes received at the Winter Olympic Games in Torino, Italy.

Medals were awarded for first through fourth place. Ribbons for fifth through 10th.

Moore and Smyth were the first to run their cars. They had two chances, but their vehicle did not travel far. They were disappointed.

“The rubber band broke, and I had to jerry-rig an extra rubber band of there,” Smyth said. “We will try again next year.”

Davidson Fine Arts School did finish fourth overall. The winning school was Rising Star Middle School of Peachtree City, with Holy Innocents Episcopal School of Sandy Springs second and Swainsboro Middle School third.

Smyth and Moore were two of the many students who competed in such events as Storm the Castle, in which students used a catapult-like device they made to launch a rubber ball at a box – the “castle” wall. They had to hit the box.

Another was Mystery Architecture. Students were given a bag with building materials – at this Olympiad, small Styrofoam balls to be linked by toothpicks – and were asked to build a tower 13 inches tall and strong enough to hold a baseball for 30 seconds.

And there was a Mission Possible with students asked to build a Rube Goldberg-like contraption that would unroll a certain length of toilet paper within a specified time.

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