How To Build A Horseshoe Pit

What You Need

36″x72″
Saw
Large Hammer
Screw Driver (preferably a battery operated drill with screw bit)
Screws
4 Horseshoes
4 2×4”s – 36″ Long
4 2×4”s – 48″ Long
Sand – Enough to fill 2 36″ x 72″ Boxes
2 24″ Stakes (solid metal pipes)

How To Make

Making a backyard horseshoe game is pretty simple actually. There’s no need to worry about making it professional with the bounding boxes and pitching platforms and all that stuff. These are the basic instructions to make a simple horseshoe playing area that consists of 2 pits, that’s it, that’s all you really need when playing horseshoes.

You are going to need to repeat these steps again for the other pit (obviously)

Start by making a frame for your pit, take 2 of the 36″ 2×4”s and 2 of the 48″ one”s and making a rectangle. Screw the pieces of wood together. This is the frame.

Now your grass is going to get ruined in the pit area anyways, so what we like to do is dig a few inches down into the ground in a rectangle so that your frame top sits a tiny bit lower than the grass. It can be flush if you want, its not really important.

With your frame hole dug out, place the frame in the crater. Now take your 24″ stake and jam that sucker down into the middle of the pit using your large hammer. You only want between 13-15″ of the pipe sticking out of the ground after we put the sand in (next step) so be sure you leave a few inches to compensate for the sand. You can make the pipe longer (so you have more to hammer down into the ground) if you want to give it more stability, but its up to you.

Next fill the frame with sand. Remember that the pipe needs to be sticking out 13-15″. But the sand will get moved around alot, so being exact isnt a necessity.

Now measure 40 feet from where you put the first stake and that is where you will put the opposite stake. Repeat the instructions above to create the 2nd pit area.

Thats all there is too it. Now, if you wanted to make a regulation horseshoe pit, this is not it. This is for the casual backyard gamer who wants something for his guests to do while other people are playing cornhole and Washers.

How To Play

A Ringer is a shoe that rings around the stake, or encircles the stake. This is worth 3 Points
A Shoe In Count is a shoe that is within 6 inches of the stake. A shoe that is leaning against the stake is also considered a Shoe in Count. This is worth 1 Point

2 Teams of 2, teams line up on opposing sides. Each team throws 4 shoes, 2 by each member. The points are added up and the other team throws.
First team to 40 points wins.

These are basic rules, you can change them as you choose.