The Atoms took home the district champion title after defeating Responsibility High School last Friday on Four Year Run in the Virginia High School League’s (VHSL) newest sanctioned activity: competitive driving.
VHSL officials praised the team’s “innovative use of the Ossian Hall parking lot as a Formula One track” and “fearless interpretation of school zone speed limits” during the final relay, where the Atoms had attempted to leave campus before the crossing guards finished blinking.
“The kids here have some serious talent,” VHSL competitive driving referee Victor Skidmore said. “You can’t find drivers who are swerving by speed bumps this fast elsewhere.”
During the championship match, the surprisingly licensed drivers competed in a wide range of events including the 200m street race, horn honking, and the horseplay relay.
Going undefeated in the 200m street race, Senior Speedy McPherson owed his success to his family’s van.
“It’s really built for acceleration,” McPherson said. “Most people see this as another disaster for my parents’ auto insurance bill, but it’s gotten me through the toughest stretches of Four Year Run.”
Another standout competitor who carried the Atoms to the finish line was junior Jessica Loudhorn, who set VHSL records with 89 careless horn honks per minute.
“Horn honking has really become my bread and butter,” Loudhorn said. “Some people contribute to society. I give my unnecessary auditory feedback to everyone within a five mile radius of AHS.”
Districtwide attention has also turned to the horseplay relay, an event where students create a “structured group coordination effort under rapidly evolving conditions,” according to VHSL guidelines.
Unlike a traditional relay on a track, the horseplay relay involves a team of four students looping around the Ossian Hall parking lot, stretching across Four Year Run, then circulating back from the stadium field lot. Rules included students being closely grouped together while maintaining continuous forward momentum and appropriate emotional spacing, both of which tested their situational awareness.
Despite finishing strong, the Atoms expressed their hesitance in interpreting the rules.
“Nobody really knew what to do,” senior Miles Crashwell said. “We kind of just tailgated each other really fast and hoped for the best, even if it ended up scratching my bumper.”
Students not participating in the championship match reported being a tad bit inconvenienced by its presence on campus and timing during their commute home.
“I was just trying to walk to the plaza,” freshman Cross Walkman said. “Then suddenly there were horns, races, and what looked like a coordinated emotional crisis moving at high speeds. I thought pedestrians had the right of way.”
VHSL official Dale Yieldworth later clarified that pedestrians do, in fact, have their right of way in “most traditional contexts,” though the “competitive driving environment pedagogically simulates the ambiguity of real-world decision-making during continuous motion.”
After ending the season successfully, the Atoms look forward to defending their title next year, though several students admitted being unsure of what exactly they are defending.
“It doesn’t really make sense as to how we won,” Crashwell said. “But neither does anything that happens on Four Year Run at this point.”
