Excitement builds as Lancaster's first ‘Krazy’ soapbox racing event already looks set to break records

Liam Mulligan, sales and marketing manager at the Royal Kings Arms Hotel in Lancaster, was speaking at the official launch event of Krazy Races Soapbox Derby in September and said: “This hotel has been in Lancaster 400 years in a couple of years and my role is to engage more with the community and local businesses.

"I was inviting business people to the hotel and a lot of people didn’t know we existed.

"I thought what can I do to attract people to the city so I decided to put on a soapbox derby for the city and had to invite Krazy Races to put this event on in September.

"This is a one day event in Lancaster. We are blessed with some fantastic events in the city and we want to be part of one of these great events this year.

"We want it to be the one single greatest event in Lancaster this year.

"It’s not just about the city or event it's about doing good things for good causes.

"We’ve partnered with a couple of very important causes, North West Cancer Research based at Lancaster University, and Six Connections in Burnley who are looking to bring their organisation to Lancaster. “

Danny Scoffin, head of marketing at Krazy Races said: "We started the business in 2018 with our first event in Shrewsbury in Shropshire in 2019. The event surpassed our expectations to be honest with you and we won best new event in the UK. We were inundated with people saying come to our area we really want you to come and of course that was the year 2020 which I’m not sure many of you remember but something happened that year and a lot of events were cancelled for a couple of years.

"We came back with a bang last year to do our events we did three events last year which got between 12-20,000 people involved. What's really special about our event and what’s amazing about today actually is we are all about bringing people from across towns and cities together, we do a lot of work with businesses and councils and like Liam and the team here.

"After coming back on a high last year at our last event getting through it, I went away on holiday to Greece and I sat there and I got an email from Liam saying ‘we’re a hotel in Lancaster, we’d love the idea of something crazy coming to our area, and I was just sat there on a sun lounger going ‘what’.

"We put a list together of different places that we thought would be amazing to go to and Lancaster could be an obvious one and seeing the area and coming off the train and thinking 'wow’ it’s just like a shortbread biscuit tin coming out here it’s just amazing.

"We can’t do these events, our free to attend events, without the support of our businesses.

"This event is really special, not just the location of Williamson Park but working with amazing hotels, being able to do things like this where we really can network and bring everyone together is just incredible.

“The event starts at 11am on Sunday, September 17 in and around Willamson Park in Lancaster.

"Two to four weeks before the actual event there will be a scrutineer event where our teams get to meet our safety experts.

"Our engineering team come to this event and it’s like an MOT, we check your brakes are working, is anything sharp etc.

"You are given a time to come to the event.

"A maximum of 40 teams are taking part and we were oversubscribed quicker than any event we’ve ever done before.

"There is a lot of excitement about it locally and nationally. The Real Housewives of Cheshire took part in a Cheshire Krazy Races, so who knows who will be racing with you!

"There will be a particular area for each team and the event will be all over Williamson Park.

"There will be at least two times to race through the day and there will be a screen with a live feed showing the race.

"We do our top ten fastest soapboxes , then we have trophies for the fastest three cars, craziest car, how the car looks etc.

"It’s all about having fun and raising money for charity.”

“We’ve raised over £60k for charities which is one of the cornerstone of our events.

"Hopefully for the Lancaster event we will raise more money than other events this year."

Mayor of Lancaster Councillor Joyce Pritchard said: “I’m really pleased to be here for this launch. We have a mayoral car that we considered entering with a few modifications!

"We are very grateful for making this possible. It’s a bit of a risk we have taken but this fabulous event will bring the community together and create a lot of excitement.

"We’ve never had this kind of event before but it will bring people into the city to explore and stay for a few days.

"Our city is unique and well worth visiting.

"We are absolutely delighted and we are very happy to support this event as it helps to promote the vibrant and dynamic city.

"It’s for all ages and we hope that lots people will come and it will be really successful.”

For more information visit https://www.krazyraces.co.uk/lancaster-krazy-races/