WAHOO -- Tom Donahue knows how costly mistakes can be in one of his favorite Saunders County Fair competitions.
For six straight years, Donahue and his teammates had finished second in the men’s division of the hay hauling contest, which is always a crowd favorite at the fair.
On Wednesday, Donahue, Justin Heldt and Rob Joseph, all of Yutan, edged nine-time defending champions Doug Vrana of North Bend, Brian Chvatal of Prague and Matthew Soukup of Lincoln to claim this year’s title.
“God, that was fun,” Donahue said after his team -- named “Tired of Getting Second” won the event.
In hay hauling, a three-person team loads a set number of square bales of hay into the back of a pickup, drives through an obstacle course and then unloads and stacks the bales. For the men’s and boys’ competition, there are
42 bales; women and girls load 21 bales.
Donahue’s team completed the task in 4 minutes, 16 seconds to win by 2 seconds.
“The stack and how you drive (are keys to good times),” Donahue said. “The tighter the stack, the better it is. But the biggest thing is to do it without penalties.”
His team knows about that. During the past six years the team had competitive times but
always lost by 5 to
10 seconds because of penalties, Donahue said.
Teams can be penalized for a variety of things, such as breaking a bale, leaving a bale on the obstacle course, improper stacking when unloading and safety violations.
“It’s fun just to see how fast you can load and unload,” Donahue said.
For Vrana and his teammates, winning in Saunders County goes back to their days in high school.
“It’s been close some years,” Vrana said.
Folks filled the bleachers and staked out spots around the arena fence to watch the competition.
“The crowds -- they just go crazy for this,” Vrana said.
Vrana, Chvatal and Soukup all work on farms and deal with hay bales on a regular basis. So do Heldt and Joseph.
In fact, Heldt and Joseph had unloaded 450 square bales before the competition and had to rush to make it to Wahoo in time.
The Saunders County Fair runs through Sunday. Today’s events include the annual parade, set for 6 p.m., and the best dressed goat competition.
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