Day of Fun Carries an Anti-Drug Message : Involvement: The Red Ribbon Festival kicks off a week of activities that promote a drug- and alcohol-free environment.

MISSION VIEJO —  Straight Arrow and Dope Destroyer competed against each other in a soapbox derby Saturday, but both racers carried the same message.

“I’ll never try drugs,” chimed driver Chris Bohenski, 7, whose sleek, yellow-and-blue wooden soapbox racer, Straight Arrow, defeated Dope Destroyer in an early heat.

Chris and his father adorned Straight Arrow with anti-drug slogans, such as “California Against Drugs” and “Feel What’s Real, I’m Drug Free” to celebrate Orange County’s official opening of Red Ribbon Week, an annual nationwide display against drug use.

An estimated 3,500 people flocked to the county’s 3rd Annual Red Ribbon Festival, held at Saddleback Community College, which marked the first in a series of weeklong events that will include parades, workshops, anti-drug walks and prayer breakfasts.

“This is really exciting to see so many people involved,” said Sandy Marzilla, a festival coordinator. “Everyone has a positive attitude, and it’s great to see the community come together in an alcohol- and drug-free environment.”

Red Ribbon Week began in October, 1985, to commemorate the slaying of federal drug agent Enrique Camarena, who was tortured and murdered in Mexico.

In California, the National Federation of Parents for Drug-Free Youth has joined with Californians for a Drug-Free Youth Inc. to spread the message that the staggering supply of illegal drugs flowing into the state will dwindle dramatically if demand is slowed.

“The primary purpose is to organize the community and show kids that they can have fun doing things together without drugs,” said Saddleback administrator Thom Thomas.

Besides the soapbox derby, Saturday’s festival, held in a school parking lot, included skateboarding, trick bicycle-riding performed by a local Explorer Post, games, magic acts, food and aerobics lessons.

Brad Hayes, 14, of Fountain Valley, a member of Explorer Post 360, stood at the lip of a steep wooden bowl, licked his lips and then, with a precise flip of the skateboard under his feet, plunged downward, returning to the top of the bowl on the other side.

Orange County Sheriff’s Deputy Brad Warner said that while drug use among children and young teens is steadily decreasing, it continues to take its toll in the county. Warner was among 35 deputies, high school students and college students who erected two mock cemeteries early Saturday morning along the San Diego Freeway to illustrate the mounting number of dead drug users in Orange County.

The group set up 722 small white crosses in a dirt field south of Irvine Center Drive at the San Diego Freeway, and 722 more crosses on a grassy knoll south of Jamboree Road, to symbolize the number of deaths related to heroin or cocaine use in Orange County since 1987. Those 1,444 deaths include 243 people who died from using either of the two drugs in the past year.

One person dies every 36 hours in Orange County from heroin or cocaine, Warner said. The death toll does not include those who might have died from other drugs.