Dear Editor:
For my science fair project I did "Going, going, gone!" My project was determining if corked baseball bats would make the ball go further. I got this idea because Sammy Sosa corked his bat. I wanted to see if it was really that bad. My research paper explained what Sammy did and how long he was suspended for. He was suspended for 7 games. My hypothesis was "If the inside of a baseball bat is changed, then the ball will go further."
The types of bats I used were 2 wooden bats. I drilled 6 inches into one bat and filled it with cork. I filled the top with saw dust and a small piece of round wooden stick. We had to use wood glue to make it stay in place. We had to let the bat sit and dry overnight. The next day was testing time. Of course it was 22 degrees and blowing like a tornado was coming in. Good thing we were up against a hillside. The distance was not affected. I hit the balls off a tee. After the test, the corked bat hit the ball further. My hypothesis was right!
My test was successful and I didn't have to sit in that freezing wind! Hooray! It was an exciting experiment, Science Fair was fun!
Neil Farias
Dolores Middle School