Trucking Life

About 10 years into his 12-year driving career, Karl Blissenbach of Jacksonville, North Carolina, suffered a health issue that basically put him in “park” with his former employer. And, despite demonstrable improvement in his condition, the military veteran said, the company refused to put him back on the road. “So, I said, ‘Fine,’ and I started looking for another job. I’m glad I did,” he said. “I really like this company.” “This company” is Forward Air Corp., a carrier based in Greeneville, Tennessee. Blissenbach says making the move gave him a new lease on his driving career. During decade since joining Forward Air, he has covered much of the lower 48 states, to the tune of 300,000 to 500,000 miles a year, he reckons. “A favorite? It’s hard to say,” he said of the ground he’s covered. “Every state is beautiful. I mean, I love going through Montana. They got some beautiful creeks and streams. So does Washington, and Portland in Oregon,” he said. “Every place has got good stuff.” What’s the secret to surviving in the trucking business? Keep it simple. “What makes a person a good driver is paying attention and doing your job,” said Blissenbach, now 62. “If you do a good job, they’ll give you more jobs.” In addition to being a good driver, Blissenbach, who served in both the U.S. Marines (1978-1982) and the U.S. Army (1986-1989), has another thing going for him in his career: He works for a company that describes itself as “extremely veteran-focused.” Forward has been nationally recognized for its driver programs, which are designed to get willing vets behind the wheel and out on the road. The company also supports causes that can make a tangible difference in the lives of wounded veterans. In addition, Forward has established its own charitable foundation, Operation Forward Freedom, funded through a portion of sales in the online company store, through which it provides monetary support to various nonprofits. One such group, Hope For The Warriors, received a $10,000 donation in honor of Veterans Day this year. That money that will make life-changing improvements for veterans, helping them to restore their independence by providing adaptive driving equipment and rehabilitation for those who have lost the ability to drive. “Forward is committed to America’s servicemen and women, who continue to make the ultimate sacrifice for our country,” said Tom Schmitt, the company’s chairman, president and CEO in a release announcing the donation. “As an organization, we show our gratitude to those who served and are currently serving, by joining with other veteran supporting organizations, like Hope For The Warriors, to provide opportunities and programming for military families,” Schmitt continued. “It is our honor to give back to our nation’s veterans with this donation.” Such gestures do not go unnoticed by employees, particularly those who have a military background. Richard Rhine spent 16 years in the U.S. Navy and has been with Forward for two of his nine years as a professional truck driver. “It’s definitely a vet-friendly environment here” he said of his employer. “I’m going to drive for as long as I can physically do it.” Like Blissenbach, Rhine says he feels that Forward appreciates his life experience. The 62-year-old said that, from dealing with pandemic conditions to inclement weather, the company has demonstrated it understands the skillsets that only come with having “been there, done that.” “Dealing with all the other traffic is the biggest challenge in driving,” he said, adding that 2020 offered truckers a respite from that particular headache. “We had a special treat during the pandemic when they made everybody (else) stay at home and we had the roads to go ahead and do our job. That was nice, and due to the crunch, the money has gotten much better.” Blissenbach agrees. “Yeah, the pandemic made the job better. We got a lot more work,” he said. “People kept buying TVs because now, they had money. And I got to haul them. We also got some raises over the last year because the company’s trying to keep us.” Blissenbach and Rhine — both veterans of the military as well as experienced drivers — also find time to impart their knowledge and experience to the company’s younger drivers. The result, they hope, is helping new drivers get off to a good start and make the most out of their driving careers. “Most companies prefer team drivers, so I tell them to try to find you somebody that you can live with 24/7,” Rhine said. “If you can find that person — which I have fortunately been able to do — you can have a good living out here. The money is available, if you’re willing to work,” he advised. “If you can hang on and get past a few hard road bumps you’re going to have with your co-driver, you’re going to do good.”

If Angelique Temple had decided to throw in the towel on trucking years ago, it would’ve been understandable. After all, the first time the Queens, New York, native mentioned wanting to be a driver, her father immediately put his foot down. “I was 12 and my dad was a supervisor for the New York Times,” Temple said. “I was riding with him, and he was showing me some other things and I said, ‘Look at that. That’s what I want to do,’ It was a tanker. “He was like, ‘Oh, no, no, no. No daughter of mine’s going to drive a truck.’ Because back then, the stories were horrid about the truck drivers. It wasn’t a good thing,” she continued. “So, I was like, ‘Oh, okay.’” There was just one problem: Temple never let go of that the dream she discovered that day. In fact, the older she got, the stronger the dream became. Finally, she set off to driver’s school in Virginia (where she still lives), determined to change minds, prove people wrong and generally reshape an entire industry. “Trucking school was great, because I actually was only one of two students,” she said. “Back then, everybody wasn’t really going to school (for truck driving); a lot of people were getting grandfathered in,” she recalled. “So, I went to school, and it was just me and another gentleman. I didn’t have to worry about a whole crowd, and it was great.” Once out of driving school, it didn’t take long for Temple to discover just how deep and ugly attitudes ran toward women in trucking at the time. But as a single mother with mouths to feed, quitting was never an option — and Temple said her kids’ pride in her career was enough to drown out the haters. “I think what makes a driver in this line of work good is the dedication,” she said. “It has to be dedication to doing the job, meaning pre-planning. You’ve got to get up at a certain time. It doesn’t matter what you thought you were going to do that day. Just get the job done. That’s No. 1.” During those days, Temple’s children became more than just her family; they were also her biggest fans. “They made sure I didn’t quit. They made sure everybody knew who I was,” she said, pride evident in her voice. “Most of the time raising them, it was like single-mom status. My oldest, when people asked her questions about me, she said, ‘We’re trucker’s kids.’ They all had that attitude growing up.” Temple began driving tankers, just like the one she saw on that outing with her father. “I started delivering gasoline,” she said. “My dispatcher, my first day, he gave me four loads. That was my first day on my own. I came back and he said, ‘What’s wrong?’ I said, ‘I’m done.’ He said, ‘You’re done? You can’t be done.’ I said, ‘I am done.’ He said, ‘Let me see your paperwork.’ “From that day, he told me, ‘I’m going to nickname you Tornado. That’s going to be your CB handle,’” Temple shared. “I literally live that. It’s become part of my personality. I even have it on my personal vehicle — on the front windshield it says ‘Tornado.’” Temple wasn’t just fast; she also brought a unique blend of conscientiousness and fearlessness to the job. Tanker driving isn’t for everyone, but she embraced the challenge. As the loads got more dangerous, her reputation for being safe and reliable grew. Soon she was hauling more dangerous cargo. “It really was different from starting out pulling gasoline, and then where I was pulling hazmat,” she said. “You go from just going to gas stations, which is dangerous itself, to pulling things that you cannot get on you. You go to pulling acid that, if it touches you, you might not make it home. “So, it was a big difference pulling into different plants and securing the load,” she explained. “As far as driving, you had to know your distance, know you can’t be like other drivers where you push up on cars. That load’s not going to stop like you want it to stop. You can stop, but the liquid’s going to keep going (surging). It’s dangerous, but it was what I loved to do.” In the years to come, Temple became one of the recognized authorities when it came to hauling hazardous materials along designated routes in Virginia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and South Carolina. Some of the largest chemical companies in America called, asking for her by name. “I was dedicated to some accounts (including) Philip Morris and DuPont,” she said. “I was the only driver that the company owner had that was ever self-dispatched. The customers called me directly. That started from the beginning.” As Temple’s reputation grew stronger, so did the demand for her driving skills. “One day they put me on something else, and they put another driver on — and the customer called,” she said. “They said, ‘No, we need Angie to come here. If we can’t work with her directly, there’s going to be an issue.’ Drivers would call and say, ‘Hey, we can’t do this load.’ Dispatch would call me and say, ‘What can you do?’ So, I’m fitting in their loads and I’m fitting loads that got added on.” Even though it meant extra work, Temple knew it was important to build solid relationships with customers. “It was like a built-in relationship between me and the customers, because if I said I was going to bring it, they knew it was going to happen, regardless of what I had to do to get it there,” she said. After nearly 20 years, Temple decided she was ready to realize her ultimate dream of business ownership and launched her own company, Tornado Transport. “It was good training because I had to be more than a driver. I had to figure out how to work from the driver’s standpoint, and being self-dispatched I had to figure out how shippers operate, how customers operate,” she said. “I had to get all my information, all my ducks in a row, because when I stepped away from being a senior driver, I stepped away making $120,000. I was the highest-paid driver there. “So, I had to make sure when I’m stepping out, that whatever I’m doing is successful from the first day,” she added. “And it has really been phenomenal.” Temple doesn’t haul hazmat with her new company. Instead, she’s decided to pull 52-foot box vans behind her 2018 International LT625, and she hauls a little bit of everything. In addition, she’s got two other businesses that are just about ready to roll out — one in logistics and one in real estate. Years of success haven’t made Temple forget the lean times she and her family endured. Because of this, she’s constantly looking for ways to help others. “We do a lot of charity work,” she said. “Like Thanksgiving, we gave to two charities to feed the homeless. That’s something where my husband and myself both had the same heart. It was something that I always wanted to do, being a mom of six — to try and find ways to give back because I know how it feels.” Temple is also in high demand through the Women In Trucking Association, where she mentors young women to help them build the confidence and find the support that was lacking when she started out. Even so, it “ain’t all sugar coating,” she admits with a laugh. “I have people come up to me even now, through Women In Trucking, and say, “I wish I could do what you do,’” Temple said. “Well, you can do the pity party, but you just can’t do it with me. I have an answer for you, for everything, and how you can do it. You just have to be willing to do it.”

In many ways, diving and Krysta Palmer are one and the same — there’s much more going on than meets the eye. Talking to the willowy blonde for the first time, you’re immediately struck by her engaging personality and easy sense of humor. Listen a little closer, however, and you discover there’s steel underneath the skin. And for that, she knows exactly who to thank. “My parents have had a lot to do with how far I have come,” she said. “A lot of what my parents taught me, they taught through showing me. My dad was always working to pay the bills, and my mom was always traveling with me as a kid to go to all my competitions. They really showed me what dedication looks like.” It’s not particularly newsworthy to hear an athlete give praise to their family for their support, but that doesn’t change how much Mitch and Vicki Palmer have meant to their daughter’s athletic career. It all started when Mitch, who is a driver for Schneider, and Vicki decided a structured athletic activity would be good for Krysta. In fact, as Vicki tells it, it was practically key to their daughter’s very survival. “Her brother, Devon, is five years older than her. They’d go out to play and I’d be in the house doing whatever I was doing,” remembered Vicki. “And they’d come home, and Krysta would be like, ‘Mom, guess what we did?’ And I’d be like, ‘What?’ ‘Well Devon and I went in that wagon, up on the big hill around the corner of the house and he let me ride the wagon all the way down the hill. And I lost control of it, and I went into the ditch.’” Vicki said with a chuckle and a shake of her head. “It just pushed me into a panic mode. Oh my gosh, I’ve got to get her into something athletic of her own,” she added. Krysta’s grandmother suggested gymnastics for the rambunctious 5-year-old, an activity Krysta took to like a duck to water. But, unlike the other little tykes, she had a singular goal from the very beginning. “I started in gymnastics hoping to become an Olympian,” Krysta said. “But I had a knee injury at the age of 12 that really set me out of my sport for about a year to recover. I tried to return to (gymnastics), but I actually had grown a whole lot taller. I was trying to return to the sport in a completely different body.” During her attempted comeback, Palmer noticed the trampoline at her gym and was captivated. After a period of doing both, she shed gymnastics for trampoline full time and got her first taste of national and international competition. For all her success, however, she couldn’t shake the injury bug and suffered two more knee injuries, one on the eve of a major international competition. “She was national champion in trampoline, and she was going to go to Paris with her teammates to the VISA Challenge, which is an international competition,” Vicki said. “Four days before she’s supposed to go to Paris with her teammates, she injures her knee again. Four days.” After riding along to the meet (what her father called a very expensive cheerleading trip), Krysta returned home unsure what the future held, if anything, in competitive athletics. “The knee injuries really set me out of the sport and had me thinking, ‘I’ve got to pay attention to my health for the long run,’” she said. “I decided my health was the most important thing. I left the sport and tried to pursue an education, because education lasts for your lifetime and sport is only for a short period of time.” She enrolled in community college in her hometown of Carson City, Nevada, trading the competitive arena for the library. Then one day a friend who was a diver asked her to come watch him poolside at the community center, ultimately inviting her to give it a shot. “(Krysta) did a couple of tricks off the high dive, and he said, ‘Wow! You really need to go see Coach Jian Li You up at Nevada at the college.’ So, she did,” Mitch said. “She walked on to the club team, and then pretty soon the coach asked her to be on the college team.” Krysta entering the sport of diving in her 20s — an unheard of attempt; most of her teammates and fellow competitors has been at it since they were tots. But Jian Li, a former elite diver, knew a protégé when she saw one, and her instincts proved spot-on. Palmer not only competed; she also excelled her way into a full scholarship. In addition, she earned recognition as Mountain West Diver of the Year and NCAA All America honors. Her parents got to witness a lot of her competitive success, thanks to the indulgence of Schneider. “With her competitions being in different cities around the country, Schneider oftentimes had an operating center or at least a transfer yard or whatever in a big city. So, we just worked with the company and my dispatcher in order to get routed to those cities when she had a competition,” Mitch said. “They’re so good about doing that,” Vicki said. “We just absolutely love Schneider because of it. It’s just been fantastic.” The icing on the cake was when the company made it possible for the Palmers to watch Krysta at the Olympic Trials in Indianapolis; then followed that up with an internal campaign to drum up an army of fans from within the company’s employees. When Krysta made the squad bound for Tokyo, her parents weren’t the only ones who cheered. “That’s what was really cool about Schneider,” she said. “(Indianapolis) was my most emotional competition, because all my life I’ve been chasing after this dream. It’s a nine-year dream in the making with diving, but it’s really a 24-year dream throughout my whole career. So, for my parents to be able to watch me qualify for the Olympic games was one of the most special and memorable moments in my career. It’s not just me that got me there, it’s my tribe of people.” COVID-19 prohibited Mitch and Vicki from traveling to the Tokyo Olympics this summer, so they settled for a special setup in Florida that U.S. Olympic Committee set up just for parents, so they could watch the competition among other scheduled activities. For her part, Krysta got off to a bad start in the games and nearly didn’t clear preliminaries, but she charged into the finals in her typical scrappy underdog fashion. She claimed the bronze to the delight of her parents and Schneider employees across the company. Now, with her sights set on Paris for 2024, she’s grateful to the “village” that helped to raise a champion. “My dad has always been my motivator; he’s always the one who’s picked me up. He’s really shown me what dedication looks like,” she said. “My mom’s always been caring and loving and passionate; she’s picked me up when I’d fall with injuries. She’s been so supportive throughout my career. “And my coach really gives me a lot of confidence. No one expected me to perform well. No one had any expectations of me coming into the sport of diving,” she continued. “She always says to me, ‘You’re the new tiger. There’s no pressure on you.’ Knowing that I was climbing the ladder quickly was exciting, because every time I got the opportunity, I’d showcase my diving and how far I’d come. I maybe always felt like an underdog, but I’m coming — and coming at you,” Krysta concluded.

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Two truck drivers who were killed while helping at the scene of an accident on Interstate 81 in West Virginia have posthumously earned their Highway Angel wings from the Truckload Carriers Association (TCA). Adam “Troy” Miller, 53, of Hagerstown, Maryland, and Ashish Patel, 46, of Ontario, Canada, were honored late last month by TCA. Miller was a driver for Portner Trucking in Thurmont, Maryland, and Patel drove for Bison Transport in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. According to police reports, at about 7:20 a.m. Thursday, July 1, two crashes occurred near an entrance ramp on I-81 following a heavy rain. The first crash happened when two passenger cars lost control, hydroplaned and crossed the median, striking a parked tractor-trailer and becoming wedged underneath the trailer. Several motorists, including Patel and Miller, stopped to help. While they were assisting the victims of the first crash, the driver of an SUV lost control near the scene, striking the rear of a parked tractor-trailer and hitting Patel and Miller. Both men died at the scene. Miller’s widow, Julie, shared with TCA that her husband had a 28-year career as a professional truck driver and was on his way to work that morning. She wasn’t surprised that he had stopped to help. “He was an excellent driver,” she said. “He could put a big rig in the smallest space I’ve ever seen in my life. He took his job very seriously. And he always pulled over to help someone.” Miller loved fishing, working on muscle cars, and playing 8-ball and 9-ball pool, Julie shared. “He was a diehard, fall-over Pittsburgh Steelers fan — the only one in the family,” she said. “He was easy to smile, easy to laugh. He would do anything for anybody.” Patel’s widow, Shilpa, said her husband enjoyed being a professional truck driver and that he always accepted challenges that came his way — for instance, he spoke no English when he moved to Canada from India in 2010. He had driven for Bison Transport for four years, and in 2019, he received a Safe Driver Award for 250,000 miles of safe driving. “He helped others get their licenses and learn about the job,” she said. “He always encouraged people. He always shared the good points about the driving life. If someone was looking for a job, they would ask Ashish. He said, ‘If you are young, drive a truck. It will help you have a long road for your life.’”

Truck drivers have been subjected to DOT physical examinations for decades, but many don’t fully understand the implications of failing an exam. “It will slap you in the face,” said Robert Palm, an owner-operator leased to Roadrunner Freight. “I went to the bottom. It’s more than you just lose your job. You’ve also got a truck, you got obligations, you got a family — how do you tell your employer that they’re not gonna issue me a new medical certificate?” Many of you may recognize Palm as the founder of the charity group Trucker’s Final Mile (truckersfinalmile.org), which aids and helps to reunite drivers and families after a death or medical emergency. Not too long ago, he discovered his own health was in danger. While Palm — who weighed less than 160 pounds and thought he was in good general health — was attempting to get his two-year medical certification approved, a problem was discovered: His blood-glucose (sugar) level was too high. The doctor informed Palm that he wouldn’t be able to issue a medical certification. An A1C blood test, which provides blood-sugar information over several months, indicated Palm had type 2 diabetes. He was shocked. “I had no idea,” he said. “I have absolutely no symptoms whatsoever. I’m cooking in the truck and walking, and I think I’m doing the right thing.” Luckily, he had two weeks left on his current certification. He used that time to make some dietary changes and to exercise, mostly by walking. He also took medication prescribed by the doctor to get his blood sugar levels under control. When the two weeks were up, Palm returned to the clinic, where he received a six-month certification, along with the unwelcome news that more work would be necessary to extend his certification. Soon afterward, Palm attended an industry conference in Birmingham, Alabama, that he says changed his life. At the conference, he learned about the Fit to Pass program, which is designed to help CDL drivers pass their physical and DOT certification exams. One of the speakers was Leah Shaver, president and CEO of the National Transportation Institute. Shaver referred Palm to Fit to Pass, where he was paired with a health coach named Diana. “I gave (Diana) a hard time because I was obviously aggravated at the time,” Palm remarked. “You know, you’re having things thrown at you, but she wants to get to the process of teaching me how to eat better, how to identify, carbohydrates and proteins.” And there was exercise required. Lots of exercise. “She talked me through an exercise regimen. I thought I was doing enough, because I was walking for distance every day,” he said. “I thought I was doing well but I was just delaying the inevitable.” Staying in regular contact with Diana helped Palm change his lifestyle and protect his livelihood. “Diana was a champ,” Palm explained. “In the beginning, I was lost. I didn’t know anything. I couldn’t tell you a protein from a carbohydrate. I was eating white bread all the time. I like green tea, but that green tea just happened to be 150% sugar.” With Diana’s coaching, the regimen of proper diet, exercise and medication worked. Palm returned to the clinic after a few months and received a one-year certification. During this exam, his blood-sugar level was a third of the original reading, and his A1C score came down, too. Palm said he plans to make the healthy changes he has made permanent, adding that he has every intention of sticking to the program. “It’s not only is my career on the line but it’s my health, too,” he said. He still gets coaching calls from Diana, but now they come every two weeks. Palm has learned a lot about his own health this year — and he also gained firsthand knowledge about the support system for driver health on the road. It isn’t good, he says. “A person with type 2 (diabetes) needs to check their blood (sugar) regularly, and you need these test strips,” he said. “I was, at one point, doing (this) three times a day. There’s only 30 test strips in each container. I was always running out, and (as a truck driver) you can’t always stop at a Walmart or a pharmacy to resupply yourself.” Palm believes basic diabetic testing supplies, as well as other health supplies, should be regularly stocked at truck stops. “I was quite shocked by (the lack of medical supplies). I mean, you’ve got every junk food in every aisle that they could pack in,” he stated. “They talk about wellness and health for drivers; but they don’t have supplies to check blood sugar or blood pressure.” He spoke of the difficulty of getting a big rig into a chain drug store’s parking lot — an unsafe maneuver in many cases. “Then, there has been issues with predatorial towing companies that will tow your truck or boot it if they see you at a major store,” he noted. “Even if you’re there to purchase something, they’ll boot it.” Some truck stop chains have made efforts to offer healthier food choices and provide exercise rooms, walking tracks and other health amenities, but the COVID-19 pandemic has restricted drivers’ access to many of those. Palm, however, thinks the trucking industry could do more to make health supplies and services available to drivers. “There’s no reason why we can’t do that as an industry,” he remarked. “The trucking companies have members at the National Association of Truck Stop Operators (NATSO) and at the national trucking associations. They sit at the table. They can raise their hand and say, ‘Let’s do this.’” Palm says his experience has given him an added incentive to help other drivers deal with their own health issues. “It’s a mission of mine to help other drivers do this and find out about it,” he said. Palm plans to continue driving a truck and working with Truckers Final Mile for a long time. Thanks to Fit to Pass, his health coach and his “can-do” attitude, health issues won’t be stopping him.

Lots of truckers take their pets along on the road, but few have had as powerful a connection as that between Michael Van Ness and his pup, Bandit. “Oh, he loves to ride,” Van Ness said. “If we go somewhere and we don’t take him, oh he’s mad. He loves to ride.” People are so passionately connected to their pets that suggesting one owner has a deeper relationship with theirs over another owner is very often considered “fightin’ words.” And it can be hard to understand why a pup that only rode along for a little more than a year could be so essential to the health and happiness of its owner. But few can argue these points when it comes to Van Ness and his beloved dachshund. “I lost my wife in May of 2019,” he said. “She committed suicide, so he’s been kind of my support pet. “It’s hard to explain, but it was just so nice to reach over there and pet him and just have a little of that companionship,” he explained. “When you’re out here doing a job by yourself, some days it’s just hard to keep motivated, you know? I mean, thank God we have cell phones now to keep in touch, but I still think it’s the greatest thing to have a pet along as a companion.” Van Ness grew up an Iowa farm boy, driving tractors before graduating to big rigs. In 35 years on the road, he’s hauled a range of materials over a million miles, from hopper trucks full of grain to reefers, dry vans and tankers full of chemicals. Based in the Midwest, he’s been all over the lower 48, and has even driven routes to Canada, though he doesn’t do that anymore. About the only thing that’s been as constant and prevalent in his life besides trucking has been dogs. “I’ve always had a dog myself, and then with my kids when they were growing up,” he said. “When we started getting into the wiener dogs, we got into raising those in the house. They weren’t out in a kennel and so they got plenty of attention. “(Bandit) was one of the litter of puppies we had,” he shared. “He was supposed to be my son’s dog, (but) then he decided to get a big dog. Well, they were going to trample him! That’s why you stick with one size of dog, you know?” Van Ness said he favors the dachshund breed because of its “smarts” and its fierce loyalty. “They’re total smart. They may be small, but they think they’re a Rottweiler and a pit bull combined,” he said. “That can be kind of a bad thing with them, but they’re very loyal and very protective. If somebody was messing with a family member they would go after them.” But even Bandit has his more social side. In fact, at the Walcott Truckers Jamboree in Iowa earlier this year, the pup placed in the best-dressed pet competition, decked out in a Hawaiian shirt and a colorful flower lei. As for Van Ness, he revels in being known as Bandit’s “doggy daddy,” something that’s common among drivers and pets. “A lot of drivers get known for their pets as much as for their trucks out on the road,” he said. “People have a dog, and they get known for that. Like, a buddy of mine had an English bulldog for years and when his last one passed away, he got another one; then he got a French bulldog. So, now he has two and he’s known for that.” At 17, Bandit’s days of riding the highways are over. Instead, he’s content to be pampered by Van Ness’ girlfriend back home, patrolling the house and waiting eagerly for dad to come home from the road. “Oh, yeah, he loves his retirement,” Van Ness said with a chuckle. “He’s got his stroller. He loves to sleep in the stroller now. My girlfriend opens the door for him so he can bark at cars and see the other neighbors walk their dogs by. I love to take care of him, just like he took care of me.”

Jazmin Vazquez never bought into the thinking that there are different options for men and women when it came to the workplace. The California spitfire, who was named Women in Trucking’s Member of the Month for October, has some choice words for anyone who tells her she can’t do something a man can do — but she prefers to let her accomplishments do the talking. “On the road, it’s only men; I think there was only one of my friends, who was a co-worker, who was a female my age,” she told The Trucker, speaking of her early days as a truck driver. “It was so crazy because we would tell each other the stories that would happen. We wish we would have seen more women on the road because the roads that we would take would be like Oxnard, Bakersfield, but the only women I would see would be in the warehouse. That would be it,” she shared. “They’d see me, and they’d be like, ‘Oh wow, how is it out there?’ That’s their first question. ‘Is it hard?’” she continued. “I’m like, ‘You know what? It IS difficult, but anything that’s good, you have to put in the work.’ It’s not just going to come easy.” A product of Los Angeles now living in Chino, California, Vazquez took an extended road trip as a youngster on one of her dad’s runs to the Pacific Northwest. Ever since that day, she knew she wanted to drive. However, she quickly discovered her father didn’t see things the same way as she did. “My dad was an owner-operator, and I really enjoyed that trip, stopping at the gas stations, smelling the trees in Oregon. For me that was my first experience. I was like, ‘Oh I want to do this!’” she said. “But the thing is, (while I was) growing up, my dad really told me that he didn’t want me in the industry.” Vazquez said she watched her father teach her brother to drive, wishing she could be the one learning the ropes. “He was training my brother like at the age 16 on the truck. I would tell him, ‘I want to do it. I can do it. You can teach me, and I can learn,’” she recalled. “I don’t know if it’s a man thing or just coming from a Hispanic household, but he wasn’t very supportive of that.” Despite that early discouragement, Vazquez, now 26, had made up her mind. She attended driving school in 2018 and committed herself to her dream of getting behind the wheel professionally. It was an experience that tested the limits of her commitment. “I worked at Amazon, and I was working 60 hours a week — and I was working at Chase Bank too,” she said. “I still remember the nights that I did not sleep, studying for that test. I studied my ass off! At my house, with my mom, my dad, my sister and her husband with their kids, my brother — they were so loud, I couldn’t study. So, I had to leave and sometimes study at Jack-in-the-Box,” she continued, adding that she learned to provide her own encouragement. “I was like, ‘It’s okay Jazmin, it gets better.’ Nobody realizes how much work you have to put in to study,” she shared. “You have no idea how proud I am of myself that I did it.” Vazquez began her professional driving career in 2019, hauling freight over-the-road before deciding to take a yard tractor driving position with NFI two years ago, in part to stay closer to home. Not only was Vazquez among the only female drivers on the road, but she was also one of the few in the country who operated an electric heavy-duty truck, a Kalmar Ottawa electric terminal tractor. She was even included in Run on Less — Electric, an electric truck technology demonstration event, in September. This new electric-vehicle technology, while appreciated for its reduction in noise and exhaust, made her runs no less demanding. Not only was she making dozens of drops and hooks each day, but she also handled the hefty charging cables and other mechanical demands herself. The experience only solidified her girl-power mentality. That mentality, further reinforced by her experience with the Women In Trucking organization, underpins her best advice to the next generation. “I would tell them to make sure you definitely want to do something like this,” Vazquez said. “Just know that you can do anything. No matter what anyone tells you — that you’re not capable of doing it, and it might take you maybe three times as long as someone else — don’t give up. Don’t give up.” Vazquez said she recently took a break from driving to get her own business off the ground. She says challenges of entrepreneurship are substantial, especially in a regulation-heavy state like California, but it’s nothing compared to what it took to get behind the wheel. “Trucking helped me out a lot in growing a small business,” she said. “On the road, I learned a lot about how warehouses work, which we use through our suppliers in our business. I am honestly so grateful for my trucking career for the financial aspects. The money I made there, I invested that, and without those funds, I don’t think my business would have made it in the beginning.” The road still beckons to Vazquez. “If anything would happen to my business in the future, I would definitely go back into that industry,” she said. “I would get back on that truck because I liked it.”

Ask Mike Lamb if he believes in luck, and the Landstar business capacity owner will nod enthusiastically. Not only did the native-born Texan find his way into the profession of his childhood dreams — being a truck driver — but he’s also an entrepreneur who found a novel way to expand his service fleet from two trucks to three. “I have one truck now that’s mine and one that’s my son’s,” he said. “My truck is going to be paid off in about six months, and at the time I pay that truck off, I was planning on buying a second truck.” He grins, then adds, “Of course, that was before the opportunity fell in my lap.” That “opportunity,” as Lamb puts it, was his winning a 2022 Kenworth T680 through Landstar’s Deliver to Win promotion, one of two annual giveaways in which Landstar provides eligible owner-operators a chance to win a brand-new truck. According to the company’s website, eligible owner-operators leased to Landstar earn entries in the Deliver to Win Truck Giveaway contest by delivering loads safely during the contest period. They also have opportunities to earn additional entries, including monthly contests held via DeliverToWin.com. After the contest period ends, all entries are pooled, and finalists are selected by a computerized random number generator. Lamb was one of five finalists who got the opportunity to select a single box among five boxes, one of which named him the recipient of the new truck — a Concord blue Kenworth featuring a 455 horsepower Paccar MX engine, front and rear disc brakes, Bendix Wingman Fusion Driver Assistance system and a 76-inch high-roof sleeper. Talking about his win, Lamb was still a bit shell-shocked, although he did confess having a strategy for selecting the right box, each of which was labeled with a letter. “I nicknamed my daughter ‘Jelly Bean’ because she loved jelly beans when she was a kid,” he said. “So, I’ve got a granddaughter now, and I call her ‘Jelly Bean Jr.’ That’s where I came up with selecting the right box. There were five boxes lettered A through E and I picked B because of the Jelly Bean.” The new truck is the latest in a whirlwind of opportunities for the independent owner-operator from Joshua, Texas — and that whirlwind was a long time coming. Lamb’s love affair with trucking began as a child, when he would visit his grandfather’s operation in Idaho. “My grandfather, Roy Harris, owned a hay dealership,” Lamb said. “He had about eight or nine trucks when he passed away. I always had a fascination of trucks from when I was really young.” Lamb’s initial career was in sales in the pest-control business. It paid the bills, but eventually he began to pine to do something he loved and that he could get excited about. Trucking was the natural choice. “I was in sales for a lot of years and just wanted a change. Got tired of it, really; wanted to do something different,” he said. “I went through driving school with Schneider back in 2005 and started driving then.” Lamb says one thing the pest-control business taught him was management skills, and he steadily began to map a plan to go out on his own in the trucking business. He’s been a BCO for Landstar since 2015. “I pretty well managed everywhere I worked in my life, so I didn’t go into it totally blind,” he said. “I decided it was time for me to build something for myself and my family instead of somebody else. I was in a position where the time was there, the opportunity was there, and I went ahead with my business.” Lamb’s luck held out during the COVIDI-19 pandemic when truckers were in high demand, even those who hauled auto parts like he does. The rest, as they say, came down to hard work and hustle. “It’s taken awhile to build. You can’t just jump off into something and expect it to happen overnight,” he said. “It’s been a lot of work in the process, but I think I’ve done it right because I’m in a pretty good position right now. I really feel like I built this automotive run that I have by being able to work with customers and just solve problems.” For Lamb, trucking is about more than just the money. “Sometimes, it’s not about the mileage pay, it’s not all about the run — it’s all about whether or not you’re happy with what you’re doing and whether you’re able to work with the people that you work with,” he explained. “That’s a big issue in the trucking business. There’s a lot of things that you have to learn about living on the road, dealing with shipping and receiving, DOT. You’ve got to wear a lot of hats in this business.” If the word from Lamb’s agent is any indication, he has indeed done things the right way, considering how fast his schedule has filled up over the next year. It’s going to be busy, and that’s with adding the new truck — which, he noted with some irony, he won’t get to take possession of for a spell due to a delay in parts arriving. Until then, he’s toying with a new moniker for his as-yet unnamed trucking business. “I’ve thought about naming the company Jelly Bean Trucking, or at least having something made that I can put on the back of the truck that says Jelly Bean,” he said with a broad smile. “It’s my good-luck charm.”

People come to the trucking industry from all walks of life. Many find that, once they get to the industry, they find a purpose and fulfillment they missed in an earlier career. That’s certainly true of April Taylor, who set aside a lucrative career in real estate law to work alongside her husband and family in the trucking industry. She says she hasn’t looked back. Taylor had already earned an undergraduate degree in business administration when a friendly competition with a sister pushed her to go for a law degree. She graduated from South Texas College of Law in 2017. At the time, her husband, Damon, owned a truck and was hauling flatbed freight. He added two more tractors and then found an opportunity with Amazon’s AFP (Amazon Freight Partners) program. The agreement added more tractors to the family business, but it also added more management and administration tasks, so Damon asked April to help him out. “It’s his fault,” she told The Trucker. “It’s his fault that we spent all that money on me going to law school, and I only practice on the side.” The trucking business doesn’t leave much time for anything “on the side.” The family’s company, branded Opulent Transport LLC, currently runs 18 CNG (compressed natural gas) tractors in the Amazon system, plus seven more that are dedicated to the flatbed side of the business. In addition, they’re looking to move into intermodal hauling. Amazon plans to expand its contracted fleet to haul its own intermodal loads from railyards to distribution centers. “I mean, all of this was new,” Taylor said of her transition into trucking. “I had to learn this whole new terminology, to figure out, ‘What’s a bobtail?’ and, ‘What’s intermodal?’” Taylor learned quickly and found that she enjoyed the business of keeping everything running smoothly. “I get up in the morning, and I’m excited to find loads,” she said. “It’s really crazy. And when the drivers are calling us in the middle of the night, I’m excited about it. It doesn’t bother me, because I know what we’re doing and what it’s leading to.” Taylor has a hand in everything that passes through the office. “My husband is the heavy-duty technician and, of course, he drives, too,” she said. “I’m uploading the BOLs (bills of lading) and the invoices and doing the billing, but then things happen. I had a driver call me today and he’s like, ‘Look, they started unloading me, and then they call me out,’ so I got to call the broker and say, ‘Hey look, my driver has a backhaul he’s got to get to.’” She doesn’t spend the entire day behind a desk. “I go to the yard. I’ll clean out the trucks, follow them to go get tires put on the tractors, carry the tires in the back of our pickup truck,” she shared. Because the Amazon tractors run on CNG, she makes sure each driver knows how to fuel the truck. “I make sure that they watched the YouTube videos, and I’m able to walk them through it,” she said. “I think I’ve gotten a touch on everything except driving.” Due to the unique nature of the Amazon runs, most of the drivers are highly experienced people who were looking for a way to get off the road. “We have two drivers per tractor, and those drivers run 13-hour shifts three days. Our rigs run Sunday through Saturday,” Taylor explained. The runs are generally less than 300-miles and the drivers are home every night. That’s a schedule that women drivers, in particular, have found attractive. “A lot of our drivers are females. They’re able to be with their families, since they’re only working three days a week and are home every day,” Taylor said. “That is a big thing for me, because I was the woman who had to call in to work whenever the kids got sick. And so, being able to provide that for women drivers — I truly appreciate being in a position to do that.” The three-day work schedule also helps in covering driver absences. “We have part time drivers that only work for us one or two days a week, but because our drivers only work three days a week, they’re always jumping on an opportunity to work an extra day to increase their income,” Taylor said. Friends and family help in the business, helping complete necessary tasks while adding to the supervisory responsibility. One of the Taylors’ four children helps with dispatching and is working to earn his CDL. Another works with the Amazon loads. “His fiancée does HR and payroll for us, so that’s taken a lot off me,” Taylor said. Another hire is the director of trucking operations for Opulent, who also has a unique story. “She actually was going to school for criminal justice,” Taylor said. “Her brother had a trucking company, and he bet her $1,500 that she couldn’t drive a tractor-trailer. So, she took the bet and got her license, as well as the cash from the bet.” Bringing in others to help allows the Taylors give back to the community, too. “We’re training one of my husband’s friends now to start (booking loads) with us,” Taylor explained. “He was just recently released from prison. He’s on board and learning and doing well.” It’s a helping hand Taylor is glad to be able to extend. “My husband has a friend who does work with inmates and (helping them get) their CDL so, I think for me, I like providing that opportunity because we know how hard it is for those people to have a second chance.” When an employee’s background conflicts with Amazon standards, Taylor looks for opportunities on the flatbed side of the business. “Everybody makes mistakes,” she remarked. “It’s just that their mistake cost them some of their freedom.” As for Taylor, she plans to stay in trucking. “I found what I’m going to be retiring from,” she said. “People only call lawyers when they have problems, right? This is so much less stress. Nobody is dying, nobody is going to prison.” Under April Taylor’s leadership, Opulent Transport is headed for a better future.

Whoever said “it’s a man’s world” never met Melissa Bencivengo-Ahorrio. The brash New Jersey native has made a career out of one supposedly “male” job after another, always beating the boys at their own game. For the past almost-four years, that’s exactly what she’s done behind the wheel, hauling a tanker for Carbon Express. It’s the culmination of a dream formed with her earliest memories with her uncle, Billy “Rebel” Conniers. “My passion started when I was 5, 6 years old,” Bencivengo-Ahorrio said. “Uncle Rebel lived in West Virginia, and we lived up here in Jersey. He would blow through town, and he would stop and visit my mom, his sister. He drove a huge Kenworth sleeper. I will never forget it; it was white with blue doors and a pinstripe down the hood. “He would let me sit in it, and every once in a while, he’d be like, ‘Ok, you can hit the horn’. And I would have to stand on the seat to reach the air horn. And I thought it was just the coolest thing,” she recalled. “Growing up, I just always had a passion for big trucks, big rigs.” It would be several years before she was able to get into the cab for real, but it wasn’t for lack of grit. Working to support her family, Bencivengo-Ahorrio held a string of tough jobs and made believers out of her co-workers — who were mostly men — wherever she went. “Believe it or not, I worked as a carpenter, building decks and houses for a contractor,” she said. “(Then) I went to work for a tree service, and there I started driving single-axle dumps, and then I started driving the split-rears, and then I started driving split-rear crane,” she said. I thought that was cool, I learned how to operate the crane.” But Bencivengo-Ahorrio had more barriers to break. “I became a mason for a year and a half. Years later, I became a driller and was driving drill rigs,” she explained. And when she finally earned her commercial driver’s license (CDL) and got behind the wheel of a big rig, it wasn’t just any gig. She cut her teeth as a driver while working for a hazmat outfit. Today she works for Carbon Express, driving tankers filled with thousands of gallons of chemicals. She quickly learned that tanker drivers are a species unto themselves. This type of trucking requires knack and nerve that many drivers just don’t have. “I gotta say, tanker driving isn’t for everybody,” she said. “It’s a ‘live’ load because of the surge. Not everybody can get used to that, because of the feel of it. We’ve had guys quit because they just didn’t like that feeling of getting hit with the surge. They didn’t like the instability and the sporadic nature of it. “For me, it just comes naturally,” she continued. “Driving a tanker is like … basically, it’s like dancing with a different dance partner every day because every tanker is different. You have compartment trailers that have bulkheads. And then you’ve got the baffle trailers that slow down your surge. “And then you’ve got the straight bullet tankers where it’s pretty much like a tango partner because it’s abrupt when you get hit with a surge. It feels like you’re just being pushed through; like being hit with a hundred bulls in the back of your truck,” she said. Even the volatile nature of the load doesn’t seem to bother the 45-year-old mother of six. When asked how she got used to hauling flammable, corrosive and downright nasty stuff Bencivengo-Ahorrio was unnervingly nonchalant — but it’s clear she knows her stuff. “We haul all kinds of chemicals. We haul everything from formaldehyde, high-tech additives for fuel. We haul petroleum oils,” she said. “We haul methanol; methanol is flammable. The high-tech additives are all flammable. And you got the formaldehyde that is corrosive. And you have the antifreeze that is a miscellaneous, but it’s poisonous. “I was really lucky. I worked for an environmental hazmat response company before Carbon Express. We were responding to environmentally hazardous spills. So, I got trained in the two years that I worked there on how to respond to chemicals, how chemicals reacted to things, how you react to the chemical, reaction to water, environment, being moved,” she shared. “The minute I read the name of a chemical I’m hauling, I immediately look it up so that if anything is to happen, God forbid — like I flip the tanker or it ruptures or there’s a spill, I already know how to recover it,” she explained. Despite being in the cab for a relatively short time, Bencivengo-Ahorrio has touched 36 of the lower 48 states. She and her Freightliner Cascadia, which has a Detroit engine, run routes that stretch all the way to the West Coast. She said she’s always amused at the reaction she gets as a female tanker driver, especially from other women. “Mostly, they ignore me,” she said. “When I’m at a truck stop every once in a while, I’ll get a thumbs up, or they’ll just give me a nod. They do not interact with me most of the time.” Not all of them are stand-offish, however. “There is a woman down here in Jersey; she’s another tanker driver,” Bencivengo-Ahorrio explained. “I just met her last week when she was fixing a light on the rear end of the trailer. She was doing it herself. There were men all over the place and she’s doing it herself, just like I did, on the side of the road.” Bencivengo-Ahorrio decided to help a sister out with a bit of encouragement and praise. “So, I parked my truck real fast, I jumped out and I walked over. I said, ‘You get it, sister.’ And I put my fist out and we bumped fists. And I was like ‘You keep it rubber side down and be safe out there.’ She was like, ‘You too, sister,’” she said. “That was the first time where I had another woman actually interact face-to-face like that, outside of being in Women in Trucking (WIT).” WIT, she said, provides her with a useful network of other women in the industry as well as informational seminars and resources through which she has expanded her knowledge. In return, WIT has recognized Bencivengo-Ahorrio’s expertise, naming her Member of the Month for September 2021. “I’ve met all of these women, women driving heavy machinery, women driving these gigantic flatbeds that have a 110,000-pound heavy load on them. It was incredible to meet these women that drive,” she said. “It’s interesting when we can sit down and talk to each other, you know, and not just trucker-to-trucker. There are dispatchers, there’s logistics, there’s trucking executives. There are so many different parts of the trucking industry in the organization. “Every once in a while, we’ll hit each other up on Facebook Messenger and we’ll be like, ‘Hey, where you at? I haven’t seen you in a while. What truck stop you going through?’ We just talk about how the work is going. ‘Have you been consistent? What’s going on in your area? How’s the weather?’” she said. Asked what she’d like to do long-term, Bencivengo-Ahorrio said she’d ultimately like to train other drivers. But for now, she’s completely focused on becoming the best driver — male or female — on the road. And thanks to her Women in Trucking tribe, that’s exactly where she’s headed. “Two years ago, I started with Women in Trucking, and I’ve gotten so much better with everything,” she said. “You can go on the Women in Trucking website, and they have tutorials. They have women actually showing pre-trips, showing safety tips, all kinds of things for women being on the road. It’s really eye-opening for someone like me.”

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Pilot Flying J has announced the winners of its annual Road Warrior Contest, which recognizes professional truck drivers who go the extra mile. According to a news release, Pilot Flying J selected Eric Curlett of Crossville, Tennessee, as the $10,000 grand prize Road Warrior winner. Eduardo Andrade of Yonkers, New York, and David Rosenquist of Monon, Indiana, have been named the second and third place Road Warrior winners, respectively. “We are honored to host our annual Road Warrior contest and give back to the professional drivers who have such a significant impact on our economy and who work so hard to serve our communities,” said Shameek Konar, CEO for Pilot Flying J. “This recognition is one way we say, ‘thank you’ to the professional drivers we get to serve each day. Congratulations to Eric, Eduardo and David for being our top Road Warriors this year – we appreciate your dedication, commitment to safety and passion for helping others.” Each year, the Road Warrior is selected based upon story submission, including contributions to the trucking industry, safe driving history, miles driven and community involvement. This year, Pilot Flying J received thousands of nominations about hardworking haulers from across the country. Curlett is a husband, father, Marine veteran and has been a glass hauler at Maverick Transportation for six years. He has an outstanding driving record and has been named driver of the month and driver of the year for the company, according to the news release. While Curlett is always willing to go out of his way to help fellow professional drivers, he also gives back to his community, including participating in a yearly convoy that raises money for the Arkansas Special Olympics. “After 20 years of faithful service in the Marine Corps, I knew the trucking industry had plenty of opportunities in any direction and found that open-deck trailers were the best fit for me,” Curlett said. “To those that are looking to get into the industry, I recommend they research everything and don’t hesitate to call companies and other drivers to get the information needed to make the decision that is right for you.” Curlett was nominated by a fellow professional driver and friend, who described him as “one of the best humans” he has ever met. To announce his grand prize win, Pilot Flying J partnered with Maverick Transportation and Curlett’s family to surprise him with the news in a congratulatory video. “I’m honored that a peer and friend in this industry nominated me for this recognition,” said Eric Curlett. “I didn’t expect to win and it definitely took me by surprise. I look forward to taking my family to a warm weather place to spend a week together.” In addition to the $10,000 grand prize, Pilot Flying J awarded $5,000 to second place winner, Andrade, a father, grandfather, Army veteran and Master Driver for Baylor Trucking who has logged more than 2.5 million safe miles. Third place winner, Rosenquist, received a $2,500 prize in recognition of his 40 years as a professional driver with 5 million accident-free miles.

There was a time when Diane McNair-Smith didn’t dare dream about the future. Her “here-and-now” wouldn’t allow it. However, were it not for those dark days, she might not have been inspired to become a light for others. “I tell people, ‘Just make one step,’” she said. “I don’t believe in ‘I can’t.’” The New York native is founder of 3 Girls Trucking, her own transport company. More recently, she started 3 Girls Trucking Academy, where she helps people from of all walks of life learn to drive tractor-trailers, thus gaining the skills needed to follow her lead to self-respect and financial security. “I haven’t had a student that came to me yet that didn’t leave with their CDL. Since I’ve been doing this, I’ve had four students that failed. I retested them and they passed,” she said. “Now, I’m not going to give you anything — you have to earn it,” she added. “You can kill someone driving a truck, so I’m real careful about how I grade my students. But if you enroll in my school, I got you. I want to spend time with you and get you what you need. That’s what I’m here for.” McNair-Smith was born in Brooklyn, New York, but her family relocated to Magee, Mississippi, when she was very young. After high school, she started a career, but her life took a dark turn, and she finally reached a turning point. “I went through a domestic violence relationship with my ex-husband, and I went to seek help,” she said. “During that time, I was in the hospital for two or three months. When I got out of the hospital, I went straight into trucking.” A career in trucking wasn’t something she’d ever considered before. “The reason I went into trucking was to feed my family. At the time, I had three daughters who were little, and I couldn’t afford to go back home to my ex-husband,” she explained. “I looked at the newspaper, and I saw the trade called truck driving. I said, ‘I don’t know if that’s for me or not.’ But I ended up making a phone call. I tried it and I liked it. I never looked back.” McNair-Smith racked up four years on the road before launching her own company, 3 Girls Trucking, eventually building it into a five-truck operation. She said when she began her life behind the wheel, she was breaking a lot of stereotypes for as a woman truck driver, especially a woman truck driver of color. “I got looked at funny. I got talked about,” she said. “And, at that time, my kids were ashamed of me driving a truck, because all the kids made fun of their mom because she drives trucks. In the long run, they realized why I was doing it.” Two years ago, McNair-Smith was inspired to open her own trucking school. Recalling how her own trainer took a hands-off, disinterested attitude, she was determined to take a different, more personal approach to her students. “I had taught at another school, and I didn’t like the way they taught. The student was just another number,” she said. “I just saw them take the students’ money and whether they passed or not, they just sent them home.” At 3 Girls Trucking Academy, students are treated like people, not numbers, according to McNair-Smith. “I try to work with them. A lot of people don’t learn like other people, so I’m patient with my students,” she said. “I talk with my students. I find out if they have a personal problem. I find out what it is that’s going to get in the way of their learning. If they have a problem, I tutor them myself.” Even when students pose a challenge, she doesn’t back down easily. “I had one guy, he had been turned down from two or three different schools because he just couldn’t get general knowledge and just couldn’t pass it,” she explained. “But I stayed with him for four months until he passed all his tests. I told him, ‘It’s not how quick you get it; it’s that you get it — and once you get it, no one can take it away from you.’” The school’s clientele is 65% women, but accepts all comers. McNair-Smith says she doesn’t view people based on their gender, race or background. However, she admits she is particularly drawn to people who are looking for a second chance in life, the same as she was. “I see myself in men and in women because I can relate,” she said. “I have men that’s been abused by women. I have a lady that came three weeks ago straight out of the shelter, straight to the school. I see a lot of me in them. I’ve been there, I’ve done that. “You’ve got to have passion for what you do,” she continued. “If you don’t have passion for what you do, you’re in the wrong business.” It’s not cheap to run a truck-driving school, especially considering 3 Girls Trucking Academy is self-funded. McNair-Smith keeps the lights on the same way she bootstrapped her trucking company — through sheer hustle and determination. She’s also got plans to purchase land on which to build a bigger facility and reach more students. When the “ministry” mentality McNair-Smith takes toward her work doesn’t align with the bottom line, she walks on the side of ministry, confident that someone up above won’t let her fail. “My school is very popular. Not because it’s my school, but people know what I do and people know that I give,” she said. “I’ve given out 32 scholarships since I’ve been open, and without my school being funded. I just give back to the community. I don’t care where you’re at. My students come from all walks of life,” she said. My goal with women is to let them know that we can do just as much as men can do or even better. I get a lot of people who write letters that want to come to the school that can’t afford to come. I have people from prison that come to my school that I place with a job.” 3 Girls Trucking Academy is a family affair. “My daughter is here at the school with me, and me and my baby girl butt heads all the time,” she said with a laugh. “Sometimes she’ll say, ‘You’re losing money, Mom.’ I say, ‘Baby, it’s not about the money. It’s my ministry. This is what I do. I’m trying to change lives one at a time.’ I say, ‘When you get to be my age, you’ll understand what I’m doing and why I’m doing it.’”

“Persnickety” isn’t a word often associated with trucking. Definitions include “overparticular about details,” “picky,” “exacting” and “hard to please.” At Plymouth, Wisconsin-based Sargento Transportation LLC, the carrier with an address of “One Persnickety Place,” drivers are most definitely persnickety about safe driving. Out of a fleet of 45 trucks, 21 drivers have driven a million safe miles or more. Among those drivers is Duaine Conrad — and he’s racked up more safe miles than any other driver in the group. In fact, he’s half a million safe miles ahead of his nearest competitor at the company. Conrad was recognized by Sargento this year for achieving 4.25 million safe miles on the road. Conrad has been with Sargento for 33 years, delivering the company’s pre-packaged cheese and other products to grocery warehouses and distribution centers. The company recognizes its safest drivers annually with a cash bonus and other incentives. Conrad’s start in trucking was decidedly “old school.” He drove grain trucks in the summer time and worked in the shop during the winter, when loads were hard to come by. Then one day, a friend invited Conrad to ride along on a trip for Filippo & Sons, a carrier that hauled Sargento products. That’s where he learned the ropes. “They gave me a start,” he explained, “I got smashed across the chest when I ground the gears.” His training continued, and then he finally had a chance to haul his first load. “A driver became ill and they needed someone, so they asked me if I’d cover for that driver and take a load to New Jersey,” he recalled. On that first route, Conrad followed another truck that was going to the same destination, so he had access to a mentor that could answer questions and provide assistance when needed. “I didn’t really know enough about a semi at the time, but I rolled with my buddy, and he sort of tuned me up as I got the feel of it,” he explained. One adventure he recounted was when he tried to slide the tandems on a trailer, but the brakes were out of adjustment and wouldn’t hold. “I never knew how until he showed me one day,” he said. During those early runs, Conrad often encountered Sargento company drivers on the road and at delivery locations. He eventually decided to put in an application with the private carrier. “The manager here wouldn’t hire me because I was driving for a company that hauled Sargento products,” he explained. “So, it came to be that one day I just got fed up and quit.” It wasn’t long before Sargento had an opening for a driver, and since Conrad no longer worked for Filippo, he was hired. When he returned to the terminal after a week on the road, his truck was washed by a young high school student named Louie Gentine, who is now the CEO of the company. Today, Conrad runs anywhere in the U.S., but avoids one region whenever possible. “I paid my dues on the East Coast,” he said. On most trips, he picks up a return load of ingredients for Sargento products, keeping the deadhead miles to a minimum. “I leave Saturday evening or Sunday morning and then I’m home on Thursday by noon,” he explained. Retirement isn’t a part of Conrad’s near-term plans, although he’s been as careful about planning for that day as he is about driving safely. He’s been contributing to the 401(k) plan offered by Sargento since he first became eligible. “As soon as I started, I put 12% of what I made away,” he explained. “If you start putting a portion of your income into savings, you don’t miss it. When times are hard, you just grind and get through it.” Company match funds and more than three decades of contributions and interest have made it possible for Conrad to retire whenever he’s ready, but he isn’t done yet. Regular bonuses for safety and fuel mileage also make up a part of Conrad’s earnings. “I really don’t go over 60, 62 miles an hour, all week long,” he said. “A lot of times I’ll stay at 57 and it’s pretty easy to get 9.2 miles to the gallon on that meter and hold it.” Conrad says his slow and steady approach pays off. “Other trucks pass me up, but by the time I get there they’ve only been there for 15 minutes,” he said. “The way fuel prices are right now, we just can’t afford to waste fuel.” Idling isn’t an issue, he noted, because Sargento trucks are equipped with APUs. Conrad’s pride in his profession runs deep. For years, he would polish his truck and enter it in truck shows in Louisville, Kentucky; Waupon, Wisconsin; and St. Ignace, Michigan. Pitting his stock company truck against entries by owner-operators who had much greater ability to customize their entries, Conrad still managed to take home trophies at several events. “When I went to Louisville with a truck we leased from Ryder and placed third out of nine entrants, it quieted the room down,” he remarked. “But it was a lot of fun. It’s like a big family organization at the shows — a lot of the same people with the same soul.” The pandemic year of 2020 was an eye-opener for Conrad. “It got ugly for a couple of weeks, until people finally started realizing this wasn’t going to work,” he said. “I had to basically live in my truck for a while. Restaurants closed down, and at some places you couldn’t even go in.” Conrad has a few safety tips for other drivers he shares the road with. He starts with “slow and easy” and adds “keep your eyes moving.” He recommends keeping track of other vehicles in the vicinity. “When I see a vehicle coming down a ramp, until he goes by me, I have to know where he is,” he explained. He counsels new drivers to have respect for the road. “I mean, flying down the mountains and stuff, if you don’t have that respect to keep your speed down and under control, you’re gonna get in trouble,” he warned. Now working toward 5 million safe miles of driving, Conrad plans to get there the same way he gets home each week — by being persnickety about safely.

It’s not uncommon for truck drivers to have a host of accessories in their rigs. After all, there are thousands of products available to decorate and personalize the cabs. Todd Ramey has done this for his truck — but not with custom shifters or seat covers. Instead, he added a litter box and cat toys. Ramey’s two co-pilots — Joe Perry and Steven Tyler, named after the lead guitarist and lead singer of his favorite band, Aerosmith — are striking orange striped cats that have been on the road with him for the past three years. Ramey said he tried to train his furry buddies to wear harnesses and leashes, but it didn’t exactly go smoothly. Perry is gentle, but Tyler is “a little high strung,” Ramey said, laughing. So, for now, the two “road rockers” are free to roam the cabin, as long as it’s a safe environment. Ramey said his company even let him remove the passenger seat so there would be more room for the cats, their litter box and accessories. Ramey speaks of his four-legged companions as members of his family, even though they love to create mischief. And they DO create mischief. A photo shared by Ramey shows the two looking innocently at the camera while lying on a bed amid what was once a roll of paper towels — before the felines gleefully shredded it to bits. While on the road, however, the cats are pretty well-behaved, Ramey said, adding that they help get his day started. “They sit in the corner, on the dash by the windshield,” he said. “That’s their corner. They enjoy the ride.” Ramey found Perry and Tyler at a cat rescue in Nevada around three years ago. Perry had been rescued from a garbage bin and was in pretty rough shape before a mama cat at the shelter adopted him. “Right after he was born, someone just threw him away,” Ramey said. “Someone heard the faint meowing from the trash can and rescued him to the shelter. Around that same time, a cat at the shelter had kittens, and the mother adopted him as one of her own.” Ramey said he had planned to adopt just one cat when he went to the shelter, but he was talked into taking Perry and Tyler as a pair. Turns out, it was a perfect match. “They said, ‘They need a buddy, so they won’t be lonely,’” Ramey said, chuckling. “So, I got both of them.” Ramey said one of the biggest challenges for pet owners on the road can be finding adequate veterinary care. Many clinics are not 18-wheeler friendly, so parking at a truck stop and taking a rideshare is the only option in many cases. “I’ve been lucky so far in that I haven’t had that challenge,” Ramey said. “But it can be difficult.” Ramey said one of the best things about having pets on board is just having someone to talk to. Perry and Tyler have heard Ramey’s stories and troubles, but they never judge or talk back, he said. Instead, their reaction is a gentle meow or a soft purr at the touch of their “daddy’s” hand. “It’s really great having them,” Ramey said. “I think every driver should have a pet on board.” Right now, Ramey, 58, is sidelined from trucking because of a medical issue. He lives in eastern Nevada with his wife. When he’s better, he said, he wants to go to work for one of the mines near his home and drive a dump truck. Ramey has been in trucking since 2004, and driving is in his blood. He remembers riding along with his dad on a soda truck route, and he said he has cousins who have also been in the industry. “I also used to ride along with Dad when he hauled potatoes from the fields,” Ramey said. “It’s something I’ve always enjoyed.” As for carrying pets along for the ride, Ramey said he has a message for his fellow truckers. “If you are going to get a pet, go to a pet rescue. Puppy mills just breed problems,” he said. “If you do have a pet on board, make sure they get microchipped and spayed and neutered.” Ramey didn’t say whether or not Tyler and Perry would join him in his new venture. That, of course, will be up to the company. Either way, the feline rockers will be happy. There are still plenty of fresh paper towel rolls to be shredded at home.