CONCRETE — Cascade Days is the perfect festival for anyone with a competitive streak and some unconventional talents.

Like food? There are pie- and watermelon-eating contests. Put out fires for a living? Join the firefighter’s muster. Like to sleep? Well, there’s the bed race — although you may get little shut-eye.

And there’s plenty more for the weekend of Aug. 16-17: the parade, soap box derby, popular duck race and a pet pride and talent show so nonhumans can show off. New this year is the road-kill stew cook-off for those with something weird in the freezer.

Some of the events are just for fun, or prizes, Cascade Days assistant coordinator Judie Legg said.

Others are dead serious. Take the lawn mower races — they’re all about the glory.

The racing rules take up nine typed pages and include plenty of safety warnings: Brakes, neck braces, full-face helmets and body armor are mandatory, blades must be removed, and anybody in the racing area must sign a liability waiver.

There are two divisions: lawn mowers with up to 12 horsepower and those with engines of up to 18 horsepower. And like the Olympics, performance enhancers are banned, though in this event that means special ignition switches and other special parts.

Races can last up to 15 laps and will begin with a qualifying round Sunday morning followed by the trophy races at noon.

“I just love them all,” Legg said of the variety of competitions. “I just love watching them.”

This year, festival organizers are offering a new event called the pet pride and talent show, Legg said.

Dogs, cats, iguanas — Legg said all animals are invited. Sign-ups sheets for the show and other events are available at Albert’s Red Apple Market and on the event Web site (http://www.cascadedays.com).

When Legg is not busy working at Cascade Days, she participates in some of the events herself. Last year she drove a tractor alongside her grandson, who drove a toy John Deere tractor, in the parade.

This year she is considering the bed races and the pie-eating contest.

“I told them that if they got a chocolate pie I would do it,” Legg said. “The messier the better.”

Even without the chocolate, things can turn downright gross, she said, “A lot of them (participants) vomit when they eat really fast.”

The road-kill stew cook-off is the final item on the Cascade Days agenda, and it, too, could be a stomach-churner. “They can use any kind of meat that is FDA-approved. They can use ostrich or buffalo or deer or whatever,” Legg said.

Bonnie Drake probably will not enter an event. She prefers organizing the competitions to racing a bed or lawnmower.

“I have been a judge. I have never participated,” she said.

Drake has helped out with Cascade Days since the 1970s, and she and her husband will be grand marshals of the parade this year.

“I need to practice,” she said of her beauty queen wave, but she has the car lined up — a burgundy 1940 LaSalle convertible.

“Something that everyone can do is watch the parade,” Drake said.

Elliott Wilson can be reached at 360-416-2147 or at .