GREENFIELD — On a rainy Saturday morning, when most of us would rather stay in bed, Candy Long and Cindy Burk walked down the middle of North Street, plotting out their strategy. In less than an hour, Long, Burk and their teammates from the VFW Auxiliary 2693 would be pushing a bed down the wet street, weaving in and out of orange barrels, in hopes of winning the inaugural Forty and Eight Four-Post 400 Bed Race Challenge.
Undaunted by the steady rain, Long and Burk showed off their team shirts — bright red, team name on the front and the iconic Rosie the Riveter showing off her muscles emblazoned on the back. Their bed sported a matching red spread, patriotic garland and flashy streamers from each of its four posters. The women on the team — Long, Burk, Sissy Fox, Barb Benvenuti, Kay Rowland and Anita Workman — were confident of a victory.
“It’s red, white and blue all the way today, girl!” Burk exclaimed.
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The Four-Post 400 Bed Race Challenge, a fundraiser sponsored by the Forty and Eight veterans’ honor society, matched teams of five (four runners and a rider) against each other in a double-elimination tournament. Two at a time, the beds raced down North Street, weaving between orange barrels and making a hairpin turn at the end before returning to the start/finish line for a total distance of around 200 feet. In addition, at the halfway point of the course, the rider had to swap places with one of the runners.
The six teams — the Forty and Eight, American Legion Post 119, the Sons of the American Legion, Team Glidewell, Team Mario Kart and VFW Auxiliary 2693 — were competing for a 3-foot tall trophy, cash prizes for the first three finishers and bragging rights.
Following the presentation of the colors by the Greenfield Honor Guard, teams lined up at noon for the parade of beds, and racing got underway.
After more than half a dozen heats of racing that included wobbly wheels, difficult swaps and a lot of laughter, the final race came down to the Sons of the American Legion versus the Greenfield Police Department’s Team Glidewell machine.
The race was close, with the Sons of the American Legion edging out Team Glidewell at the finish line.
“Normally I would say they won by a nose,” quipped race announcer Butch Miller, “but in this case they won by a pillow.”
The drama wasn’t over, however, as the Sons of the American Legion were disqualified due to a safety violation. The teams had been instructed to round the final barrel on the right side to avoid collisions, and the Sons of the American Legion had circled the barrel from the left.
But there were no hard feelings following the controversial finish as all three winning teams donated their prize money back to the event to benefit nursing scholarships.
Team Mario Kart, captained by Dan Larrison and crewed by Aaron Bryant, Ben Larrison, Trent Larrison, Blake McCain, Trish McCain, Addilyn Rozzell and Derek Rozzell, took top honors for best costumes. Dressed as the characters from the Mario Kart video game, the team showed up in style with its own pit-stop garage — a pop-up canopy to shelter both the team and bed from the rain.
“We saw the advertisement for the bed race at the Wooden Bear,” said Trish McCain, “and decided it would be fun to do as a family.” But when they realized the event had a 14-and-older age limit, they recruited friends to fill out the five-member team.
The prize for the best-themed bed went to Team Glidewell. Using a race car-shaped toddler bed, construction supervisor Casey Short added wheels and painted it to look like a police car, complete with emergency vehicle lights.
Short sent a video of the car to Police Chief Jeff Rasche before the race, earning a thumbs-up. It was Rasche’s idea to name the vehicle in honor of former Greenfield police chief Charlie Glidewell who had passed away on Thursday.
Following a couple days to dry out, Dennis Dunn, Commissaire Intendant for the Forty and Eight and organizer of the event, was already looking forward to next year.
“Considering what we were facing (the weather),” Dunn said, “it was still far better than what I had anticipated.”
The rain cut back on the number of teams, the vendors, plans for a band and a DJ and an outdoor beer garden, Dunn said, but the group managed to raise more than $1,800 for its nurses’ scholarship program.
But among the teams and the spectators, spirits were high, and no one seemed put off by the rainy day.
“The grandkids were dancing in the street, doing cartwheels and flips,” said Jeannette Dunn, there to support her husband’s event. “They didn’t care.”
Dunn, standing trackside beneath her umbrella, summarized the consensus of the planning committee: “Dennis had a crazy idea for a bed race; now it’s raining and we still think he’s crazy.”
“But they were still all there,” she added.
