By Larry Coonrod, Lebanon Express writer | Posted: Wednesday, November 19, 2008 12:00 am
It's not everyday an 8-year-old can best her principal at something, but on Thursday, Macy Torgenson handily dispatched Green Acres principal Kevin Bogatin in a game of Battle Stack.
It was all part of the World Sport Stacking Association's (WSSA) third annual STACK UP day.
Participants in Sport Stacking, sometimes known as cup stacking, stack 12 plastic cups in a predetermined formation, unstack them and restack them in another configuration.
Just how serious a sport is this? Not just any old cups can be used; sport stacking cups have four holes in the bottom to reduce air resistance. Watching world champion stackers in action - a blur of arms and brightly colored plastic- it's easy to imagine wind resistance might indeed be a factor.
Bogatin first learned about sport stacking three years ago when he saw the finals of the WSSA world championships on ESPN. He bought a few sets for classrooms and stacking quickly became popular with students.
"Kids like it because it doesn't require any athletic or academic skill," Bogatin said. "Every kid can be successful. All it takes is perseverance and practice."
Stacking is now incorporated into physical education classes and lunchtime enrichment classes.
Benchmark II teacher Alan Cook thought cup stacking was a joke when it was first described to him, but now believes it's beneficial to students as well as fun.
"There's huge organizational and spatial skills and hand-eye coordination involved," Cook said. "Some kids struggle with fine motor skills like being able to hold a pencil between their fingers and write. Stacking increases dexterity. It's amazing."
Timers allow students to measure their improvement, which, Bogatin said, is what most of them are interested in, rather than beating their classmates.
"It's just fun to try and race myself against the timer," said Jett McConnell, 10, who has been stacking for three years.
Reese Clark, 10, has ambitions that go beyond beating his own time.
"I want to challenge people and be as good as they are on TV," he said.
About 250 Green Acres students took part in STACK UP, part of a larger effort to set a Guinness world record for the most people stacking in a single day. All total, about 145,000 students from 25 countries participated, according to the WSSA's website.
Green Acres received several free sets of Battle Stack for helping with the record attempt. In Battle Stack, players face each other across a playing board with a divided surface. The first player to complete his or her stacking sequence slaps a button that makes the other player's stacking surface pop up, scattering their cups.
Bogatin said the older students love the competition, but kindergarteners got upset at having their carefully constructed stacks knocked down, so now they are only allowed to play the non-battle version.
And how good a stacker is Bogatin?
"Oh, he's OK, I guess," Macy said with a sly smile after beating the principal by a full two seconds and toppling his nearly completed stack.
For more information on sport stacking, go to
the WSSA's website at www.worldsportstackingassociation.org.