Tipmont linemen triumph again, winning top honors at Indiana Lineman Rodeo

After this year’s Lineman Rodeo, we’re going to need a bigger shelf!

Congratulations to all the Tipmont linemen who participated at this year’s Indiana Electric Cooperatives Lineman Rodeo — held on Thursday, Aug. 21 and Friday, Aug. 22, at the Hendricks County Fairgrounds in Danville, Ind.

This showcase of on-the-job skills and safe operations featured competitors from electric cooperatives across Indiana. The rodeo simulated such real-world scenarios as rescuing an injured lineman from atop an electric pole, line restoration and hardware installation / removal. As they would on poles inaccessible from Tipmont bucket trucks, linemen used harnesses around their waists and spiked gaffs strapped to their legs. Events were held for both individuals and linemen collaborating as a team.

In the team competition, Tipmont dominated the Hurt Man event. Our Linden crew — journeyman linemen Shafer Cox and Tristen Hoffman, and working foreman Bobby Taylor, Jr. — earned first place, and our Battle Ground crew — working foreman Bo Bouwkamp, apprentice lineman Christian Guimond and journeyman lineman Dusty Manns — nabbed second place.

“Hurt Man trophies are always the ones you really want to get because it’s a real-life scenario you want to be good at,” Hoffman said. “When someone’s hurt, you want to get them down in a timely manner, and I was proud to see our teams do so well in that event.”

Meanwhile, the Linden crew finished in fifth place overall among competing teams.

Cox, making his debut at the IEC Lineman Rodeo, also contributed to a first-place finish in a Mutual Aid team event. This event combined three different linemen from three different co-ops for a timed task to change out an insulator.

“We didn’t know what the task was or who we were paired with until the day before,” Cox said. “I knew one of the guys from my lineman training time, but I didn’t know the other guy. So it was neat to get a chance to work with other people, get their opinions, make a gameplan and execute it.”

Among individual events, Hoffman grabbed first place in the Hurt Man event and second on the Egg Climb event.

New to this year’s rodeo, the Egg Climb is a timed task in which linemen climb the pole with a basket that has an egg inside, put the egg in their mouth when they get to the top, and then carefully climb down. Points are deducted if eggs are cracked before safely reaching flat ground.

“One false step and you’re going to have scrambled eggs,” Hoffman said. “But it’s a quick, fast and fun event in general.”

Bouwkamp brought home a third-place finish in the individual Hurt Man event. Bouwkamp and Hoffman finished third and fourth, respectively, among all 42 individual journeyman lineman competitors.

“I love seeing all the journeymen from all of our fellow REMCs get together in friendly competition,” Bouwkamp said. “We’re able to go down there and succeed as we do thanks to our support of one another and a company that helps us to do what we do.”

“It’s good for the industry and nice for families to see a little bit of what we do,” Cox said. “We’ll just keep working to better ourselves and make each other better for next time.”

Tipmont was also represented this year by competition judges Cody Hovermale (lead project engineer), Matt Lowe (general working foreman) and Jason Phillips (journeyman lineman).

And rodeo season isn’t over yet! Bouwkamp, Guimond and Manns are headed to the International Lineman Rodeo in Overland Park, Kansas, in October. (Apprentice lineman Dylan Gretencord will join them to participate as a judge in the competition.)

Many thanks to Safety Threads in Brownsburg for sponsoring our team’s gear this year, and another congrats to our guys on their great showing at the Rodeo! We celebrate their commitment to keeping you safe and comfortable.