NAZARETH, Pa. — Saturday was a busy day for the Borough of Nazareth.
Hundreds gathered for the Moravian Historical Society's 46th Annual Arts & Crafts Festival, where attendees could shop toys, wood crafts, paintings, homemade jewelry and other types of items from local artists and vendors, while listening to live music from the Nazareth Community Chorus, Nazareth Community Band, The Fine and Mellow Trip and Ziggy Blue.
Visitors were able to snack at food trucks and explore the historic 1740-1743 Whitefield House, and crowds could be seen happily chatting, perusing and sticking to the shade on the hot summer weather day.
But about half a mile away, hundreds more gathered for something with a bit more adrenaline.
The Nazareth Adult Soapbox Race brought 25 teams of racers and pushers to the hill on West Prospect Street for a gravity-fueled race of childhood joy.
After over a decade in hiatus, the race returned for its second consecutive year and 7th iteration.
The event ran from 2008 through 2012 before being brought back in 2023 and is now planned to run on the first Saturday of every June to raise money for the Lehigh Conference of Churches' homeless prevention efforts.
About 50 volunteers through the Nazareth Adult Soapbox Racing Association brought the event to life, organizing a double elimination bracket of cars shooting down the hill until a winner remained.
The top 3 finishers for the event were Rob Leiser's Rob Leiser / Orange STP #2 Brawner Hawk replica, Craig Dally's “White Dean Van Lines” and Matt Rinker's “The Ocho.”
Speed, and a laugh
Up and down the hill, watchers looked on as cars designed for pure speed raced those that were designed for laughs and joy reached speeds of about 30 mph just from a push at the top.
“You get to be a kid again. Why not be a kid for a day?” said racer Shawn Shupe, whose car was an oversized shopping cart top attached to a boxcar frame.
“It's a soapbox derby race. Who wouldn't want to do it?”
While some of the cars modeled typical race car designs and prioritized aerodynamics, others raced in a coffin, a scaled-down replica of the polarizing Tesla “Cybertruck,” a Batmobile and even a hospital bed-turned car, complete with bandaged mannequin patient.
Misty Yard raced for the first time with the team Sawfish Racin, and said it was a huge adrenaline rush to rush down the hill.
“When you're coming down the hill, it kind of feels like you're on maybe a drop waterslide,” Yard said after winning her first heat of the competition.
“My test run was really scary, but then I was like, 'Oh my god, that's amazing.'”
Celebrating Nazareth's racing legacy
“I think everybody from Nazareth, especially with the Nazareth [Speedway] racetrack, Mario Andretti… Nazareth is really supportive of racing in general,” Christine Rinker, race director for the Lehigh Conference of Churches said.
“That was our tagline for a while, 'Bringing racing back to Nazareth.'”
The racing association cites on its website the former quarter-mile dirt track and the borough's celebrity race car driver as part of the legacy the event hoped to tap into.
“Even though those glory days have passed, we still thirst for speed and showmanship,” the group states on its website.
Many attendees also cited the racing legacy of the borough as a reason for showing up and celebrating the event.
“Well, it's Nazareth right? Mario Andretti. Racing,” said attendee Rich Schneebeli. "We were thinking we'd come out and watch the soapbox derby.”
Hobbyist mechanic Rob Leiser has been building cars for the race every year, eight in total. One of those, a replica Andretti car, got excitement from the crowd.
He said the legacy for him goes a long way back.
“One of the things from when I was a kid, my father really wasn't into racing, but we'd go to the cabin on weekends. And we'd come through Nazareth, and the dirt from the stock car track was just a cloud, and then you came down to where the Sunoco station at 191 and 248 were, and it was a big sign 'Congratulations, Mario Andretti winner of the 1969 Indy 500.'”
A livestream recording of the event is available on the Nazareth Adult Soapbox Racing Association Facebook Page.
