The University of Texas at Tyler Wins Regional Concrete Canoe Competition [VIDEO]

Ever heard of a concrete canoe? I hadn't, until I read the story. The University of Texas at Tyler won the 2013 American Society of Civil Engineering Texas-Mexico Regional Concrete Canoe Competition, held over the weekend.    Evidently this is big news. I would think so, just getting a concrete canoe to float is a phenomenal feat.

The UT Tyler ASCE Student Chapter placed first overall in competition out of 14 teams, beating the University of Houston, UT Austin, Texas A&M University, Rice University, Texas Tech University and UT El Paso. This is UT Tyler’s second consecutive overall win and third first place finish in six years at regionals.

Participants build canoes with concrete and are judged in four categories: technical design report, oral design presentation, canoe final product and racing.

Here's What facuty advisor, Dr. Michael McGinnis had to say;

“Over the past few years, the students have worked not only to improve their canoe design, concrete formula and their paddling skills, but they have also been innovative with their analysis and display of the canoe. This year they took their efforts to the next level.”

The UT Tyler team also took first place in oral presentation and overall canoe quality as well as second for their technical design report. They also accumulated the most points in the racing events by finishing first in the men’s sprint and co-ed sprint race, second in the women’s sprint races and third in the women’s and men’s endurance races.

The team will now advance to the nationals this summer at the University of Illinois. Last year, the team placed in the top 15 at the ASCE National Concrete Canoe Competition.

 Congratulations to the team members:

Seniors: Michael Lisk of Houston, Clayton Carroll of Whitehouse, Tevin Dial of Tyler, Jennifer King of Victoria, Alex McMillan of Palestine, Lee Radley of Tyler, Tyler Richards of Tyler, Austin Sparks of Tyler, Matt Taylor of Terrell, Tyler Wacker of Bay City and Danica Weddle of Midland.

 Juniors: Brad Christopher of Reklaw, Erin Hostetler of Austin, Hayden Vanhoose of Iowa, Kory Wilkinson of Wolfe City and Bobby Fuller of Longview.

 Sophomores: Robert Atwell of Houston, Callie Dirickson of Mesquite and Jane Weidmer of Hallsville.

Team captains: Marco Weidmer of Hallsville and Ryan Borhani of Longview.