During the recent snowstorms, a lot of students chose to stay inside and keep warm. Some students, however, attended the annual Penguin and Pigeon races that Elizabethtown College hosts every year. This year, the competition was fierce as the reigning champions George the Pigeon and King the Penguin faced off against their rivals; Percy the Penguin and Pablo the Pigeon.
The first set of events of the day was the Penguin races. The first event was seeing how quickly each penguin could catch and eat a fish from Lake Placida. Percy managed to hit the water first, but King emerged from the water and downed his fish the quickest, making him the winner.
The second event was seeing which penguin could waddle up the Dell the quickest. King started out ahead, but Percy caught up quickly and passed him at the last second, making him the winner of that event.
The tie breaker event was the belly slide down the hill of the Dell. Percy and King started at the same time, but Percy beat King by less than a second, making him the winner of the Penguin races.
The second set of events that day was the Pigeon races. The first event was who could find and get a worm first. George won after about ten seconds of looking. Pablo was not too far behind, losing by less than two seconds.
The second race was a flight to the finish line. Both George and Pablo started at the same time, but according to sophomore Nathan Tindell, an avid spectator of the Penguin and Pigeon races and owner of Pablo and Percy, “Pablo got distracted by someone eating during the race, and he went out after the food. Pablo was in last place!”
Even though things did not exactly go as planned with the Pigeon races, it was a successful day of races for both birds. Tindell was really excited that Percy won, but he was not as happy about Pablo getting distracted. When asked if he would enter either Pablo or Percy again in next year’s races, he said, “I would race Percy again, as he is agile and won! I would not race Pablo again, because he was distracted by somebody else eating during the race.”
