Shreveport Volvo team goes to Sweden for competition | Business | shreveportbossieradvocate.com

In the next few weeks, teams from around the world will be traveling to Gothenburg, Sweden to take part in a global competition for diesel mechanic and service team bragging rights.

It is the Volvo truck version of the Olympics, a fierce, high stakes competition called Volvo Vista. Instead of vaulting off balance beams for a perfect "10," Vista team members will be tasked to troubleshoot Volvo truck issues using all the problem-solving skills they can muster.

One of the teams in the final 44 will be representing both the U.S. and Louisiana.

Team members Ted Pfister, foreman, lead technician Mark Herring, Sam Seaman of back counter parts and service manager Aaron Toomer are employed at Bruckner's Truck & Equipment in Shreveport and make up Team VAHLR. It is one of two teams competing from the U.S., and of just four in North America.

Pfister and Toomer are seasoned competitors, but Herring and Seaman are newbies. Toomer and Pfister have been to Sweden multiple times before and are part of the champion team that won the last Mack Masters international Mack Truck competition.

The Shreveport-Bossier City Advocate recently sat down with the VAHLR team to talk pre-competition jitters, training regimen — and socks.

"For Ted and I," Toomer said, "Being on winning teams before, we're looked at as the elite. So to bring in two new guys, there's a lot of pressure here. We can't just go in and fail."

New guy Herring is worried he might be the team's weak link. He came to Bruckner after 27 years in the military.

He took a job delivering parts for Bruckner in early 2023 and "a couple of months later they said, 'Have you ever thought about being a diesel tech?' No, I never thought about that at all," Herring said. He recalls that when he took the job, he had never driven a Volvo, but he had "driven a truck in 1995," he said.

The parts guy, Sam Seaman, is also a 2024 addition to the team, and according to Pfister, he has the right stuff.

"He will attack something three different ways and if that doesn't work, he will ask for help which is very important as well," Pfister said. "We're strong in all aspects if you ask me."

Scott Behe, the Senior Manager of Training Operations for Volvo Trucks North America, agreed that the Shreveport team is talented and itching to win but first they have to get past the Allentown, Pennsylvania Edgers, the other U.S. team making the trip — and team Estonia, a perennial powerhouse.

The VAHLR must also deal with the fact that they will be competing on things new to them — Virtual Reality used to diagnose service problems, unfamiliar EV trucks and European models that are different from their American counterparts in almost every way.

"We're 12 volts and they're 24 volts and they are cab over and ours are long nosed trucks," Behe said. "We can compete, but there's definitely challenges." "The engine is the engine; the transmission is the transmission- but all the components that make the truck run better are based on a computer nodule or electrical function that takes a level of skill to understand."

And then there is the long flight to Sweden, and jet lag.

To prepare, the Bruckner team has been traveling to competitions in the U.S. and training at home. They have set up stations with different challenges at the dealership and are figuring out their overall strategy.

"The hands on is usually your biggest opportunity for points," Toomer said. "Based on what the station is, (we put in) who's the strongest at accomplishing that. We divide and conquer."

"It's not always about the knowledge. It's how well you work with each other. That's what wins these competitions. You have to have the knowledge, and we have that. Now, how do we apply that as a team?"

The team also uses escape rooms to train.

"It sounds silly but if you think about it, if we're going into unfamiliar territory something we've never seen before, an escape room is just that, you walk into it blindly and you have to work as a team on the task to move to the next room or station," Pfister said. "That has really helped us learn each other's communication habits and someone's response to being stuck."

In the leadup to competition September 9-13, new team member Herring is getting his socks ready. They're a good woolen sock, he says, and red. They are his competition socks from rifle and pistol shooting, and they "only get broken out on special occasions."

Volvo Vista is one of those occasions.

"The salespeople generally get all the glory, they get the money, win the fancy trips. It's no different with truck sales", said Behe. "This is our chance as a company to shine a little light on our everyday heroes who keep those trucks running."

Email Liz Swaine at [email protected].