On November 1-3, 2024, 10-4 Magazine hosted the 1st Annual “10-4 Trucker Rodeo & Show” in Bakersfield, CA and the participating truckers really got to show off their skills. Wanting to host a competitive skills competition like the ones held back in the 1980s and 90s, which were very popular, this event featured ten different categories including backing, transfer dump, tire changing, cow loading, hay loading with a squeeze and a boom, a burnout contest, and a loudest stereo competition. In addition to the contests, there was also a competitor-judged Show & Shine, vendors, food, fun games for the kids, and a mechanical bull.
Held at Kevin Harvick’s Kern Raceway just west of Bakersfield, all the competitive events took place on the infield of the track’s half-mile oval. Spectators could sit in the grandstands to watch all the fun, or if they wanted to “elevate” their experience, they also had the opportunity to rent a luxury suite for themselves and up to 20 of their closest friends or business associates. It was a cool deal, complete with catered food and drinks (at an additional charge), if desired. And with temperatures in the low 70s in the days and cool nights in the low 50s, we could not have asked for better weather all weekend (besides a small shower on Saturday morning).
So, how did all this come about? In October 2023, we got a call from Tim Huddleston, who operates Irwindale Speedway, where we have hosted our last three Truckin’ For Kids events since acquiring the show in 2021. Having a great relationship with Tim and everyone at Irwindale Speedway, Tim told us that he was taking over Kern County Raceway and was wondering if we wanted to host a second event in Bakersfield. At the time, we said, “No, the world does not need another truck show!” However, after a few calls from Tim asking us to reconsider, we decided to do it, but this show would be unlike any other event happening out there right now.
After coming up with the rodeo-style skills competitions and theme, we then spent many months researching how these events have run in the past and talking to people “in the know” about how these types of activities should go. It was a ton of work and took a lot of time, but we eventually settled in on the contests we were going to have, how the courses would be set up, and all the rules. We worked on this stuff for over six months, along with having another successful TFK show, continuing to produce 10-4 Magazine each and every month, and attending many other truck shows. In the eight weeks leading up to our rodeo, we attended five shows in three different states! Needless to say, it was a very hectic time. But all the hard work really paid off.
Arriving on Thursday to begin setting up, some of our helpers came early, even though it was Halloween night. Those who arrived early included me and my wife Shannon, Tim and April Sieben, Roger and Annette Ghidelli (who also brought out our TFK show trailer for registration and such), Eric Hill and Stephanie Haas, who flew out from Illinois and Wisconsin respectively, Shannon’s mom Polly Kasper, our son Parker, and Kris and Angelina Gaare. Later that evening, a few more showed up, including our daughter Paige, her boyfriend Kenan, and their friend Jordyn, who all drove up from San Diego. That night, we had a great dinner at Frugatti’s – a nice Italian restaurant next to our host hotel, which was the Home 2 Suites by Hilton. Big thanks to Denise at the hotel for taking good care of everyone in our group all weekend.
Come Friday morning, the trucks started rolling in, and by the end of the day, we had already parked 100. Many of the vendors came in, as well, to set up their spaces for the weekend, along with several of the registered RVs, which were parked by our own Eric Hill, who stepped up and took it upon himself to be in charge of the vendors and RVs. The Kid’s Zone was also set up that day, which was sponsored by our friend and past cover trucker Jake Bast, and all the sponsor banners were hung, as well. Huge thanks to Double E Trucking, Mike Lowrie Trucking, Central Valley Transport, Cain Trucking, George Van Dyke Trucking, KT Charboneau Trucking, Maggini & Son Trucking, Rogue Truck Body, Ten West Towing, and Pickett Custom Trucks for sponsoring all the individual events.
There is no way we could have pulled off an event this size without tons of help. In addition to the folks already mentioned, on Friday the rest of our crew arrived, many of which also help at TFK in SoCal in the spring. Those helpers included Tammy Hinkey, Pete Zamora, Anthony Avila, Leo Monteon, Sean and Kimberly Westover, Greg and Ray Algorri, Bob Watkins (Bob 1) and his son (Bob 2) and his grandson (Bob 3), along with our friends JT and Jed, who flew out all the way from Florida to help. Thanks also go out to Okie Dan (Dan Jacobson), Marty Miles, Leon Murillo, and Pierson Gravance for helping here and there throughout the weekend.
We had never produced an event like this, and we had never held an event at this location, so we were flying blind going into this. Thankfully, the trucking community, along with our friends and supporters, were excited about the show concept – and their attendance and participation reflected that. By the end of the day, we had over 20 vendors set up and about 150 trucks parked on the lot, but what we were most excited and anxious about was seeing how the skills competitions would go the next morning and what kind of participation we would get. Our early registration numbers were okay, but we weren’t sure what to expect. Thankfully, many folks signed up for events on Friday after they parked and got their registration packets.
As mentioned before, Saturday morning started off with a pretty good rain shower that lasted about 45 minutes. Thankfully, the trucks were parked and not moving during the rain, and it stopped before any puddles or mud could accumulate. Actually, the rain turned out to be a good thing, because it knocked down the dust in the parking lot for the entire day. In addition to the vendors, Kid’s Zone, food concessions, and the mechanical bull (sponsored by our friend Evan Steger at Time 2 Shine polishing products), Saturday featured six of our ten competitions including three backing classes, transfer dump, tire changing, and loudest stereo. Emceed by myself and our weekly webcast host and digital media manager John Testa, the two of us, with wireless microphones in hand, did our best to entertain and inform the spectators in the suites and grandstands, while Tim Sieben operated as staging coordinator for each event.
The backing and transfer dump contests included a “course” delineated with cones that truckers had to maneuver through and around, and the tire changing contest featured a flatbed trailer, provided by Central Valley Transport, and (2) sets of tires provided by our friends at KRISS Trucking (they also sponsored the show’s window cards that went on each truck after being registered). Big thanks go to Lupe and his team at Daniel’s Tire Service in Bakersfield, CA for providing the tools and service trucks for the tire changing competition – along with some good advice and help when determining how the contest should go.
The last competition of the day was the “Loudest Stereo” contest. This was not a Best Stereo contest, as we had no judges, but simply a “loudest” contest. Lining up the six competitors on the track facing the grandstands, we went from left to right, giving each competitor 60 seconds to play the song or songs of their choice, while I stood just outside the open driver’s side door with a decibel reader, recording the highest reading for each one. It was a lot of fun, but let me tell you, our winner’s stereo, coming in at over 130 decibels, truly hurt my ears!
Once the stereo contest was completed, the on-track activities for the day were done at about 4:00 PM. Once it got dark, at about 6:30 that evening, the light show began in the parking lot. And what an amazing display it was, as almost every truck on the lot was lit up! From the back of the grandstands, there was an amazing view of the entire show, and many went up there to take advantage of the photo opportunity. The day’s activities officially ended at 10:00 PM, but some folks kept the party going until a little later into the night – but nothing too crazy. Thanks to everyone for having fun, but not TOO much!
The Sunday morning competitions began at around 10:30 AM out on the track. The much-anticipated cattle rustlin’ (cow loading) and hay loading and unloading competitions were scheduled for this day, and they did not disappoint. The cow loading contest included two portable chutes, one donated by Ronnie DeVries and the other by Cody and Melvin Medeiros of Medeiros Dairy. The trucks had to back up to the chute, open all the necessary gates and ramps inside, and then “load” three inflated blow-up cows, one at a time, into the nose. We had these guys huffing and puffing, as they hustled up and down those ramps, with cows in hand. It was hilarious to watch – and a big hit. Big thanks to Marty Miles for creating and posting his funny “workout” videos with Betsy (the cow), documenting his activities as he prepared for this competition, in the weeks prior to the event.
After the cow loading, it was on to the hay squeeze competition, and after some last minute changes to the course and rules, with some help and advice from the infamous Jonny Cat, the event went off without a hitch and featured 12 competitors! After the squeeze competition, we took a short break to raffle off a few prizes for the folks who were kind enough to register early, and then handed out the five competitor’s choice awards. Each winner came down to the track to claim their prize or get their trophy. Thanks to GGE Products, Brent’s Custom Trucks, RLK Services, and 4 State Trucks for donating some awesome prizes for the early registration raffle, and to Carl at Rockwood Products for creating and providing the beautiful trophies.
With a lot full of amazing equipment, the Show & Shine truck beauty contest would not have been easy to judge. Thankfully, we don’t do the judging – the competitor’s do – and we were happy with their choices. The Best Engine and Best Combo awards went to Stan Silva and his turquoise Peterbilt 389X and matching heavy haul trailer, while the Best Interior trophy went to Ryan Maggini (I mean Upton), who brought the infamous Maggini 2-axle 379 (#13) that has been featured twice on our cover over the years. Best Lights went to Ronnie DeVries and one of his stellar yellow and purple Peterbilt cattle trucks, and Best Bobtail went to Troy Charboneau and his red Peterbilt 359.
The hay bucking was the final competition, and it featured four teams of two people that went head-to-head, loading 48 bales on a trailer with an old-school boom truck, backing up about 100 feet, then hand unloading and stacking the bales back on the ground. The winning team came from behind to win by just two seconds, completing the entire process in just over six minutes. It was awesome watching these guys toss 100-pound bales of hay around like toys! Very big thanks go out to Gary and his son John at B&G Hay in Bakersfield for providing and bringing all the hay – two full loads of big bales and one full load of small bales – for all the hay related contests. Gary was also a great resource for me when figuring out how to run these hay competitions. Thanks for letting me “bend your ear” several times about all this, Gary.
And did we mention the custom belt buckle awards for all the competition class winners? For each of the ten classes, we had a custom rodeo-style belt buckle made by the folks at Molly’s Custom Silver in Texas – and these things were awesome. Thanks to our friend Jeff Botelho at Botelho Custom Trucks for sponsoring these amazing awards and keepsakes, which will most definitely be an annual tradition at this event, because everyone loved them. We hope to see folks wearing them, as they defend their titles, next year. After Mark Pounds of Central Valley Transport did his award-winning burnout in his red Freightliner cabover at about 3:30 PM and that final buckle was handed out, the show began to wind down, and folks started rolling out.
We were at the raceway until it got dark (which was not that long since we had just turned the clocks back the night before), closing everything down and packing it all up. After that was finished, we headed over to Rancho Grande Mexican Grill in Bakersfield, CA for a celebration dinner with 18 of our volunteers and helpers. What a fun time that was. We cannot thank all our helpers enough, including JT, Jed, Sean, and all three of the Bobs, who cooked for our volunteers all weekend. This was a huge event with lots of moving parts, but it ran like a well-oiled machine, for the most part. Of course, there were a few hiccups here and there, but overall, the good far outweighed any bad. Whew!!
We would like to thank everyone at Central Valley Transport in Bakersfield, CA for all the help before and during the show, Jake Bast and Marty Miles for suggesting and then helping put together the cow loading competition (and promoting the heck out of it), and a bunch of folks for helping with the rules and procedures for the hay contests including Jeff Botelho, Mike Maggini, Roger Ghidelli, Gary Haagsma, and so many more (please forgive me if I forgot you). Another person that helped out so much before and during the event was Angelina Gaare. This girl really knows how to get things done, and we could not have accomplished as much as we did for this event without her diligence, hard work, advice, connections, and perseverance!
And speaking of hard work, we would like to thank Tim Huddleston, Will Kozak, and their entire team at the raceway for taking care of the gate, the suites, concessions, security, and so much more. We are happy and proud to be affiliated with these folks and look forward to our 2nd Annual “10-4 Trucker Rodeo & Show” which will be held once again at Kevin Harvick’s Kern Raceway in Bakersfield, CA. The date has already been scheduled for November 7-9, 2025. If you missed this one, don’t make that mistake again, because it was a great time! Come out and show off your trucker skills in 2025 and earn your very own belt buckle!! The winners of the skills competitions at the 1st Annual “10-4 Trucker Rodeo & Show” were:
CLOSED BODY BACKING: Ronnie DeVries Sr. (21.15 seconds)
OPEN DECK BACKING: Steve Hettinga (20.68 seconds)
DOUBLES BACKING: Mike Maggini (48.12 seconds)
TRANSFER DUMP: Chris Sotelo (3 minutes, 45 seconds)
TIRE CHANGING: Jeremy Koot (8 minutes, 5 seconds)
LOUDEST STEREO: Elias Garcia (130.2 decibels)
COW LOADING: Ronnie DeVries Jr. (1 minute, 53 seconds)
HAY LOADING/UNLOADING SQUEEZE: Sam Harter (2 minutes, 20 seconds)
HAY LOADING/UNLOADING BOOM: Tony Rietkerk and Tony Leonardo (6 minutes, 11 seconds)
BEST BURNOUT: Mark Pounds of Central Valley Transport
EDITOR’S NOTE: Big thanks to Stephanie Haas, Angelina Gaare, and Paige Linss for taking all the photos for this event and show report.
