FFA hosts tractor driving contest

MOSES LAKE – The Future Farmers of America held a tractor driving contest Saturday at the Grant County Fair in the warm-up arena, where FFA members competed to show who had the most skill operating a tractor under pressure.

Former FFA member and tractor contest competitor Austin Kern was helping organize and manage the event.

"There's two main parts of the contest,” said Kern. “There's a written test, which is just…basic kind of all-around sort of questions about driving and tractors and ag mech kind of stuff. And then there's the actual driving part of the contest, which is the majority of the contest."

A series of cones made up a track on the dirt of the warm-up arena. Competitors maneuvered the tractor, with a trailer hitched to the back, around the cones in a predetermined path meant to demonstrate the competitor’s skill in controlling the tractor and trailer.

“Eventually you get out through all the cones, then you drive forward, and then you back into what's called the barn, which is the ending position,” said Kern. “So the goal is to do it under two minutes and thirty seconds, because every second you're over you lose a point and it's out of 200 points, I believe."

Kern, now a sophomore at Washington State University, said he competed in the contest his senior year of high school.

"It's a really hard contest because, in the first place, it’s actually really hard to just do it in two minutes because it's pretty challenging. You have to have a really good skill of backing up, because, I mean, the cones are only, you know, 20 feet apart. And it ain’t the easiest thing to back up, especially when you're under a time constraint,” said Kern.

This Grant County Fair contest was more of an informal or practice event, said Kern. The state tractor-driving event is usually held in the late fall, according to the Washington FFA website. “There's quite a few teams,” said Kern. “There’ll be about 20 teams competing for state tractor driving. So this one, we'll actually probably get quite a few kids. We'll probably get 40, 50 kids here to come practice.”

Kern said that Moses Lake placed second at last year’s state competition and that he hoped they would be going to state again this year.

“There's a lot of people, especially kids that grew up on the farm, that are really good at this contest. It's a very highly skilled contest. It's one of the more competitive ones in Washington state,” said Kern.

Ephrata FFA member Corbin Reeve came out to the Grant County Fair to compete for the second time.

“I competed last year. It was my first time ever driving a tractor, and it was pretty stressful, but I thought it was fun,” said Reeve. “So I decided I would do it again this year.”

Reeve said that he was at the event more for fun than the competitive side of the contest.

“I have driven tractors over the year since competing last year, but I still have never actually backed one up,” said Reeve. “One of the guys that was helping people was up there with me, helping with the backing up part, so I didn't jackknife the trailer.”

Reeve then explained what his favorite part of the event was.

“I think the best part is watching other people do it, because you get to point out and see what they're doing, and it's even funnier when they jackknife the trailer.”

Kern said that there would be another tractor-driving contest at the Othello Fair, which is scheduled for Sept. 13 to Sept. 16.

“It's a really good contest and…it's a really fun thing to do, and get kids involved and start learning about FFA and maybe get a little more into contests if they’re incoming freshman or maybe they weren't really into FFA and they were showing this year and want to maybe start doing some contests, it's a really good introduction for them,” said Kern.

Gabriel Davis may be reached at gdavis@columbiabasinherald.com.