Tractor Pulling, No Ordinary Sport

In the first place, you probably wouldn't dream of spending extra time on your garden tractor after you had mowed the lawn or turned over the dirt for the spring garden. After all, work is work and play is play. Isn't that right?

Well, not exactly. To some work is play. These folks soup up their tractors, give them names, get the tires inflated just right and then go to a track where they can hook them to a weighted skid. They attempt to pull three or four thousand pounds for a 100 feet. That's what the fast growing sport of tractor pulling is all about.

Two local men, James T. Johnson of King George, and Rod Hubbard, of Stafford, are big in this sport and are proud of it. Johnson competes with two tractors lovingly called "Blue Streaker" and "Blue Thunder." Hubbard has a tractor named "Plum Crazy". His nine-year-old son competes along with the adults on a machine called "Thunder Foot."

Now they aren't just a little crazy, although they would probably tell you that it helps to be just that in this sport. Tractor pulling is a family sport where competitors bring along the entire crew for a day of good times and togetherness. For Johnson and Hubbard, and probably most of the men involved, fiddling around with the machinery is what it's all about. Both men do engineering work for the federal government, Hubbard at NSWC and Johnson at Indian Head. When looking at their tractors and listening to them talk, one can almost believe they are at the Indianapolis 500. The talk is all about weights, gears, camshafts, competition and other racing subjects.

Johnson and Hubbard met at a tractor pull at the Fredericksburg Fair several years ago where they were pulling tractors they had modified. From that event they along with Dave Rohacek of Spotsylvania and Jim Clements of Caroline, got together and formed the Tri-County Pullers organization, which sponsored its first meet at Summerduck Dragway in the fall of 1988.

Tri-County Pullers has now been superseded by The Garden Tractor Pullers of Virginia, with competition sites all over the eastern part of Virginia ranging, according to Mr. Johnson " from Edinburgh to Suffolk."

The new slate of officers, elected at the group's December meeting are: Dave Rohacek of Fredericksburg, President; Ron Hubbard of Stafford, 1st Vice-President; Bubba Poligue of Mechanicsville, 2nd Vice President; Jill Taylor, Secretary and Becky Hubbard, Treasurer.

As Mr. Johnson explained, "this is the season to get together and evaluate the rules." Changes have been proposed based on the experience from various competitions, hoping that meets will run more smoothly than they have done in the past. "We are trying to get the rules so everyone can pull with the same requirements," said Hubbard.

While pulling is a summertime activity, winter is the time to tinker and rebuild machines, because from early spring through late fall the tractors are pulling against the weight transfer machine at weekly meets.

Be assured, these are not the normal scroungy garden tractor you take out and use to trim the lawn, but specially modified and very clean machines used only for competition.

The stock class is broken down into tractors that weigh in (with rider attached) at 900 or 1000 pounds. Limited stock covers the 1000 and 1100-pound machines and those in Super Stock weigh in at 1050 pounds.

Modified Class machines are divvied up into two major groups. Group one is engines under 900cc and weighing either 1000 or 1100 pounds. Modified Class group two garden tractors are either 1200 or 1300 pounds and have engines up to 1500cc.

Some special events are for children under 16 (who must have parental consent), since the weight of the rider is figured into the total weight of the class of pull.

Average tractor costs from $700 to $3000, a mere nothing in the realm of motor sports. They compete on a 100-foot course which is 20 feet wide. Tractors must run straight and not nudge the sidelines, pulling against the weight transfer machine.

The nice part about this sport is that women can compete right along with the men, as can their kids. Russell Hubbard won 2nd and 3rd place in his class last summer on his tractor "Thunder Foot".

Another nice part is that the tractors can range in price from $700 to $3000, depending on the skill of the mechanic, the sophistication of the machine and the class of the pull. It is the skill of the mechanic, which gets tested out there on that 100-foot course where the skid's weight gets heavier the further down the track the tractor pulls it.

To an uninitiated, non-mechanical viewer the sport may seem as exciting as watching a barber cut hair. To the aficionado it's the competition against others and one's own prowess that gets the juices going.