Con-way’s Krites Named Champ In His Rookie Year at NTDC

This story appears in the Aug. 16 print edition of Transport Topics.

COLUMBUS, Ohio — The National Truck Driving Championships Grand Champion said he would like to think that he had a little help clinching top honors.

For nine straight years, Carl Krites, who is a driver for Con-way Freight, brought his father to watch him compete in the Ohio Truck Driving Championships.

This year, he won in his truck class for the first time, finally qualifying for the Aug. 3-7 championships — which included the National Step Van Driving Championships. The NTDC rookie was named Grand Champion.

Unfortunately, Krites’ father, Glenn, was not on hand to see his son’s accomplishments. The elder Krites died this past September.

“I don’t know if I had a little help,” Krites said in an interview with Transport Topics after he won the competition held at the Greater Columbus Convention Center. “I don’t know, but I’d like to think so.”

Krites, who competed in the tank-truck class, edged out 413 of the safest truck drivers in the nation to be named Grand Champion at the event.

“You come in hoping not to be 49th out of 49 [in the tank-truck class],” Krites said. “Next thing you know, you turn around and this is happening.”

Krites scored the highest total points in the competition among tank-truck drivers and then was selected Grand Champion based on a handicapping system among the winners in nine truck classes.

Although Krites was the only Con-way Freight driver to win a truck class at NTDC, several of his company co-workers also were recognized for their achievements at the competition. Georgia’s Dennis Day, who competed in the sleeper-berth division, won the Neill Darmstadter Professional Excellence Award. The 3-axle division competitor Joseph Hicks of Rhode Island was awarded 2010 Rookie of the Year; fellow Con-way 3-axle competitor Ken Jensen Jr., of Washington state, placed second, and California’s Dale Duncan placed third in the tank-truck class. Also, Ina Daly, a driver representing Arizona in the twin-trailer class, was the sole competitor to have a perfect score on the written exam, said Susan Chandler, executive director of American Trucking Associations’ Safety Management Council.

Krites said he showed an interest in trucking since age 5. His family lived near a stone quarry in Buckland, Ohio.

“In the summertime, I’d take my lawn chair, sit in the edge of the lawn and just watch the stone trucks go back and forth,” Krites said.

Years later, his father helped him remember those summers, and Krites sought out a job hauling grain shortly after graduating from high school in 1978.

“I always wanted to drive a truck,” he said. “That’s all I really ever wanted to do.”

Krites now drives a local pickup-and-delivery route from a terminal in Sidney, Ohio, for Con-way Freight.

He chose to compete in a tank truck because he used to drive one for a previous job, delivering fuel to filling stations.

Krites had to rely on more than his driving ability to win because the skills test was only one part of the competition. Drivers also had to complete a written exam designed to determine the competitors’ knowledge of such issues as safe-driving rules, first aid, the trucking industry and government regulations.

Most competitors interviewed for this article expressed satisfaction with their performances, regardless of where they placed.

“I feel like I did pretty well there,” Jeff Whitaker, a driver for Holland, a unit of YRC Worldwide Inc., said of the written exam. “Overall, it was pretty close to what came out of the [Facts for Drivers] book,” he said. The publication is produced by ATA, which organizes the entire event.

“If you studied the book, you had a good idea of what was being asked in the questions,” said Whitaker, a North Carolina-based driver who competed in the 4-axle truck class but did not finish in the top three.

Contestants also had to do a pre-trip inspection, designed to duplicate how a driver checks his truck before a trip. Organizers set up trucks with defects, and drivers had a set amount of time to examine a truck and find the problems.

“I’m pretty good at pre-trip,” said Paul Brandon, a FedEx Freight driver from Connecticut who competed in the flatbed division. “I think I found most of the defects.”

Some truck classes had pre-trip defects tailored to the class. The flatbed class, in which Brandon competed, had a load that was secured incorrectly, said Mark Courter, chairman of the competition and manager of safety compliance for FedEx Freight, Harrison, Ark.

“They threw a couple curves at us,” Brandon said of the pre-trip competition. “I’m learning,” he added. “Every time you come, you learn.”

But the driving skills test, in which competitors were required to maneuver through a course designed to replicate everyday challenges, was the most visual aspect of the event.

 “You never know what it’s going to be until you get here,” Ray Jackson, a competitor from Texas who represented H-E-B Grocery Co., said of the driving course. Jackson placed second in the 5-axle class.

To prepare for the competition, Jackson and his colleagues set up courses on which to practice during time off, he said. Contestants cannot prepare for NTDC while working, according to ATA rules.

“We set up everything that we’ve ever seen [at competitions] before,” he said, including problems such as parallel parking and road kill.

“I could have done a little bit better,” Jackson said of his performance on the course.

“I told myself I could do it and I gave it my best,” said Paul Savill, a UPS Freight driver from Ohio. “It’s definitely a tough course,” he said the day after driving the course in the 4-axle class.

This year, NTDC organizers decided to have drivers complete the pre-trip inspection on the same day as the skills test. In previous years, competitors always had the events on separate days.

“The drivers seem to really appreciate that,” said Daryl Decker, a lifetime member of the NTDC/NSVDC committee and a regional safety manager for Wal-Mart Transportation.

The committee made the change to give drivers a free day. Formerly, when contestants had the two events on different days, “they were held up in the bullpen for two solid days.”

Beyond the competition, NTDC is a major event for drivers and their families, with employers pulling out all the stops for the drivers that represent them.

Con-way Freight took its drivers on a tour of the Ohio Statehouse one night, then had dinners and parties with a 1950s theme other nights. FedEx Corp. — which swept the step-van division while its freight division swept the twins class — had carnivals, parties and other major events for families throughout their stays in Columbus.

Like most participants, Rick Sebring of FedEx National brought his family, including his wife, son-in-law and two grandsons.

“I have a daughter in the Air Force, stationed in Turkey,” Sebring said. His son-in-law and grandsons flew to Columbus from Turkey on Aug. 6 but his daughter, Christie, couldn’t make it.

Sebring’s grandsons, Austin and Landon, were “in awe” after the FedEx evening events, he said. The company had a banquet and children’s carnival.

“Having been here makes you want to come back,” Sebring said, stressing that he means everyone who goes to NTDC, not just FedEx employees.

Sebring drove a sleeper berth truck after winning the class in Idaho.

For Steve Limas, placing third in the 5-axle class was a good way to end a 48-year career. The ABF Freight System employee from New Mexico plans to retire at the end of the year.

“I’m hanging [it] up,” said Limas, who has competed at truck driving competitions for more than two decades.

“After 24 years of trying to get to the top [of the NTDC level of competition], I finally made it,” he said.