SAN ANTONIO. Travis Graham, a technician with the Rush Truck Centers (RTC) store in Orlando, FL, snagged both the heavy-duty and all-around grand championships at the company’s 10th annual Technician Skills Rodeo held here over the last two days.
Graham – who competed in the event’s Paccar MX engine category – pocketed $8,000 cash and $7,600 worth of prizes for winning the heavy-duty grand championship, along with a $1 per hour raise, plus a further $4,000 in cash and $2,300 in prizes as the event’s all-around grand champion – for a total purse of $21,900 in cash and prizes.
Dustin Ebert, a technician with the RTC Phoenix store and the event’s heavy-duty champion in 2007, won the medium-duty grand championship – pocketing $8,000 in cash, $4,900 in prizes, and a $1 per hour raise.
David Zainfeld with RTC Houston facility won grand champion honors in the parts division, taking home $7,500 in cash and $4,300 in prizes.
Mike Besson, RTC’s managing VP-service operations and customer solutions, noted that 165 out of the company’s 2,468 technicians were selected to compete in the company’s 10th annual skills rodeo; an event costing over $1.1 million to put together this year.
“What this has become is a pretty incredible thing,” Besson said. “Nobody does this like we do.”
