Teams

The Molar Roller

Garage Headquarters: Poughkeepsie, NY

Driver: Charlie Dubois

Mechanics: Dan Shaw, Carrie Dubois-Shaw, Constance Tarbox

Nuts and Bolts:

Team Molar Roller has exactly what it takes to succeed at the Red Bull Soapbox Race: they’re fast, and they’re fun. The speedy part of the equation rests primarily in their driver, Charles DuBois, a retired computer programmer and math teacher who has run the New York City Marathon seven times and competed in numerous triathlons. Meanwhile, his support team is a marvel of creativity. Carrie DuBois-Shaw (Charlie’s daughter) and friend Constance Tarbox-Windish have made prize-winning floats and costumes for the Coney Island Mermaid Parade, including a thirty-foot-long Loch Ness Monster controlled by “Scottish mermaids” with tartan tails and a team of space-age electric eels that performed the Electric Slide for the entire two-mile parade route.

In addition to their parade work, Carrie and Connie work with New York City’s Faux-Real Theatre Company, and Connie teaches theater and circus to children. The team is rounded out by Carrie’s husband Dan Shaw, who works at MTV. Together they’ve devised a soapbox racer concept that’s based on the Tooth Fairy’s transportation. “It’s modeled after a Cadillac, but tricked out with all of the necessary decorations a Tooth Fairy might want,” Carrie notes. “It will mostly be made of pink glitter.”