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CapitalPress.com
Friday, May 27, 2022
Race: ‘I have a very strong competitive nature’
Continued from Page 1
THINKING ABOUT RACING?
“So I was like, ‘Sure,’”
Hennings said with a laugh.
“I’ve always wanted to. I’ve
always gone to those things
and thought, ‘Well, that
would be fun to try.’”
In 2018, she received a
trophy for being the fastest
car in the women’s division
trophy dash.
“I like the adrenaline
part of it,” she said. “I have
a very strong competitive
nature. I’m definitely one
that likes to win.”
At first, only family and
close friends knew she
raced. Two past WAWG
presidents said they didn’t
even know about it when
the Capital Press contacted
them.
But occasionally, some-
one spots her at the derby.
“It’s surprising to see
Michelle jump into the car
and then you think about it
for just a moment and, ‘You
know, that doesn’t surprise
me at all that Michelle’s
jumping into that car,’”
said Matt Harris, director
of government affairs and
assistant executive director
at the Washington Potato
Commission.
People ultimately real-
ize it fits her nature, Hen-
nings said.
“If they know me, they
know I’m competitive,”
she said. “I was competi-
tive in sports, I’m competi-
tive in everything I do.”
Randy Gray travels from north of Bellingham to race during
the derby.
Advocating for
farmers
Hennings, 45, joined
WAWG 18 years ago as
director of finance. She
became executive director
in 2014.
“My job just isn’t any
job — we fight for the right
to farm,” she said. “I love
advocating on behalf of the
farmers. It comes naturally
to me. I understand farming
because it’s part of my life.”
She and husband Scott
raise wheat and hay and
own a cattle ranch. They
have been married 16 years
and have two children, Har-
lee, 16, and Hayes, 14.
Farmers have a passion
and respect for their land,
she said.
“I understand that first-
hand because I do it,” she
said.
WAWG
constantly
reminds lawmakers and
the public about the impor-
tance of farmers as they
feed the world. Priorities
include touting the value
of the lower Snake River
dams to the region’s farm-
ers and the economy, the
new farm bill Congress
has started working on,
salmon recovery and labor
costs.
Hennings is amazed
that some people still don’t
understand how vital farm-
ers are.
“Farms are a target con-
tinually and they need to
know we are the ones that
provide safe and reliable
food,” she said. “It’s always
a goal every year to be able
to get through to those that
question what we do.”
“Michelle is a very
energetic and passionate
leader,” said Marci Green,
Fairfield, Wash., farmer and
a past president of WAWG.
“She’s effective and willing
to go the extra mile to tell
“Once you do it once, you’re hooked,” he said.
After he heard about it from friend Rick Ruzicka, Gray rode
over on his motorcycle to watch.
“So I went home, looked in the paper and found my first truck
for $400,” he remembered. “Brought it home, just started
working on it in my garage at night. Next thing you know,
we’re racing the next year.”
“Just get an old pickup, fix it up,” said Scott Hennings.
Michelle Hennings also encourages others to consider enter-
ing the derby.
Matthew Weaver/Capital Press
Michelle Hennings with her support team. From left are family friends Randy Gray
and Rick Ruzicka, Hennings and her husband, Scott Hennings.
Michelle Hennings, a Ritz-
ville, Wash., farmer and
Washington Association
of Wheat Growers execu-
tive director, will drive a
1977 Ford pickup in the
women’s race division as
part of the Lind Combine
Demolition Derby in June.
the right people what we
need done for wheat farm-
ers in Washington state.”
Wheat farmers benefit
from Hennings in “so many
ways,” said Ryan Poe, a
Hartline, Wash., farmer and
another past president.
“We would have a very
hard time replacing her, as
well versed in all the dif-
ferent areas as she is,” he
said. “She makes herself
available pretty much 24/7,
even when she is on vaca-
tion. She is a trusted, ded-
icated, passionate leader of
our industry.”
“Michelle’s work makes
farmers farm again for the
next season,” said Pater-
son, Wash., wheat farmer
Nicole Berg, herself presi-
dent of the National Asso-
ciation of Wheat Growers.
“She’s farm bill policy-ori-
ented and the safety net
that she works on helps
keep all of us family farms
in business.”
Berg knew about Hen-
nings’ racing.
“I think it’s great, a per-
son has to have some way
to blow off steam,” she
said. “It shows how well-
rounded she is for the
industry. She knows how to
talk to the farmers, and she
knows how to talk to the
Legislature. Those are two
different, complete things.”
‘Just go out and do it’
Hennings doesn’t prac-
tice before she races.
“I just go out and do it,”
she said.
How does it feel?
“I get a little nervous,
and then I get competitive,
and I just go for it,” she
said.
How fast does she go?
“As fast as I can,” she
said.
The speedometers in the
car and truck don’t work,
but Hennings’ team esti-
“Life’s short,” she said. “If you have something you really want
to try, go for it, because it’s very rewarding in the end.”
Matthew Weaver/Capital Press
Friend Randy Gray and husband Scott Hennings are
part of Michelle Hennings’ support team when she rac-
es cars and pickups during the Lind Combine Demoli-
tion Derby celebration.
Courtesy of Michelle Hennings
Hennings took home a trophy in the women’s division
trophy dash in 2018.
mates she usually reaches
35 mph.
She was “definitely” ner-
vous the first time.
“You have to learn when
to accelerate and when to let
off the gas,” she said. “The
first year, that was trial and
error. But after you get the
feel for it, you just go out
and do it.”
The race itself is “very
intense,” she said.
“I want to win, so I try
to do whatever I can to
make sure I’m in the front
or close to the front,” she
said.
Gray, friend Rick Ruz-
icka and Hennings’ hus-
band Scott help with vehi-
cle maintenance.
“You compete on Fri-
day night, and there could
be major repairs that need
to be done to be able to
actually be in the show on
Saturday,” Hennings said.
“Sometimes those guys are
up all night long, working
on the pickup or the car, if
there was damage done to
it.”
The first year she raced
in the car, another driver
hit her “pretty hard” into a
wall.
“I ended up sideways
and a gal pushed me prob-
ably halfway around the
track,” she said. “That was
an eye-opener for me. ...
I was looking at her like,
‘OK, you can stop now.’
Definitely, you never know
what’s going to happen.”
Because the car is
smaller than the pickup,
getting hit was “a little bit
more shocking,” she said.
“You definitely have
some bumps when you go
into a race like that,” she
said. “It doesn’t bother
me too much. I have never
been really scared.”
Safety requirements are
extensive, she said. They
include extra protection for
the driver’s windshield and
door and a roll bar on the
pickup.
Still, “I prefer the pick-
ups over the cars,” she
said. “You’re up higher in
the pickup.”
“She’s competitive, she
likes the throttle for sure,”
Gray said.
Naturally, husband Scott
is her biggest fan.
“She’s just a great racer,
a farm girl,” he said. “I just
think it’s like driving on
the old gravel roads back
in the day. She gets in there
and goes at it. I’m very
proud of her.”
He was not at all sur-
prised when she first
decided to race.
“I figured she’d jump
in,” he said. “I’d be nervous
to do it, because you’ve got
everyone watching you.”
Hennings doesn’t ever
see herself driving a com-
bine in the derby, the main
event. They might not go
fast enough for her.
“Yeah, they don’t,”
she said with a laugh. “I
like the adrenaline. Not
so much the crashing
into each other, but the
racing.”
Return of the derby
The Lind derby is a
major staple for the sur-
rounding community, Hen-
nings said.
“It’s bringing people
together to enjoy a sport
that you don’t see every-
where,” she said. “We’re
a farming community in
this area, so to be able to
bring everybody out to
have some fun is definitely
a good thing.”
Most of the people who
compete in the derby and
races live in Lind and sur-
rounding communities.
The derby attracts a crowd
of 5,000, bringing much-
needed money into the area.
“Everyone’s missed it,”
Hennings said of the pan-
demic-caused hiatus.
The combine demolition
derby is the main draw,
but the audience also loves
watching the car, pickup
and grain truck races — to
the point where they have
become events on their
own, said Josh Knodel,
chairman of the Lind Lions
Club board, which puts on
the derby.
“We didn’t think it
would take off like it has,”
he said.
The powder puff race is
equally important, he said.
“A lot of this takes so
much time away from fam-
ily,” he said of preparing
the event. “So it’s great
when the spouses can par-
ticipate, too, and make it a
true family event.”
The value of farming
While growing up in
Ritzville, Hennings’ fam-
ily raised wheat, hay and
cattle.
“I grew up with the
value of farming, seeing
families grow up and rais-
ing your kids on the farm
and how important that is,”
she said. “I love it. It’s not
just something you do for
a job. ... You’re contribut-
ing to people, you’re grow-
ing their food. I think that
is more valuable and more
rewarding to be able to also
bring your children up in
that kind of atmosphere.”
She started dating Scott
her freshman year of high
school.
“It was pretty much love
at first sight, I think,” she
said.
They went off to col-
lege, Scott went into the
military, and then they got
back together.
“It was really special,”
she said.
She attended Washing-
ton State University for a
year, then transferred to
Eastern Washington Uni-
versity in Cheney to com-
plete her bachelor’s degree
in business and accounting.
In school, she played
basketball, tennis, softball,
was a cheerleader and bar-
rel raced in rodeo.
Hennings coaches youth
sports and is an officer on
the Ritzville Rodeo Asso-
ciation, overseeing the
annual Ritzville Rodeo
Labor Day weekend.
Their kids compete in
junior high and high school
rodeo.
Would they ever race
or compete in the combine
derby?
“I think they both have
the competitive nature
enough to do it,” she said.
“We’ll play basketball and
everyone’s pretty competi-
tive on wanting to win.”
First to the finish line
The skills Hennings
uses in racing also apply to
her work at WAWG.
“Working for the advo-
cacy arm of Washington
wheat growers, we consis-
tently have strategies for
various goals we want to
accomplish so that farm-
ers can be proactive and
not reactive to issues,”
she said. “Racing is sim-
ilar — you look into who
your opponents are, watch
as they time in, and put
together in your mind
how you’re going to get
to the finish line before
they do.”
Hennings urges Wash-
ington farmers to share
their story. She advises
lawmakers to do their
research and reach out to
farmers about the impacts
their
decisions
will
have.
“I never thought I
would be on the politi-
cal side of things,” she
said. “But now, when you
start to understand how it
affects everyone’s lives,
I feel that it was just my
calling to work on behalf
of the wheat farmers in
Washington state.”
Shortage: ‘Things are not going to get better in the short term’
Continued from Page 1
expect delays in equipment
and parts deliveries to get
worse in the foreseeable
future.
“Things are not going to
get better in the short term,
so we need legislation to
address these issues,” Eide-
berg said. “The longer we
wait, the longer we are going
to feel the pain. There is a
real sense of urgency here.”
Port congestion and labor
shortages have conspired to
hinder shipments of machin-
ery components, preventing
manufacturers from fulfilling
demand for new tractors and
combines, experts say.
The lack of computer
chips required for high-tech
features in modern farm
equipment is but one exam-
ple of the problem, which
also extends to more mun-
dane parts such as tires,
windshields and knobs.
“All it takes is trouble get-
ting one or two items and you
can’t make the machine,”
said Michael Langemeier,
an agricultural economist
at Purdue University who
tracks the farm equipment
industry. “There’s no magic
pill here. No easy fix.”
During a recent tour of
Midwestern manufacturing
facilities, Eideberg routinely
saw unfinished farm machin-
ery sitting outside factories,
waiting for components to
arrive.
It’s taking about five to
six times longer now for
mechanics to acquire service
parts than before the corona-
virus pandemic, he said.
Meanwhile, the inven-
tories of some equipment
dealers are so depleted that
they’re buying machinery
simply to strip it for parts,
Eideberg said. “That’s how
desperate people are.”
Machinery sales slumped
due to weak commodity
prices during much of the
past decade, so the recent
resurgence in crop values has
spurred farmers to invest in
new technology, Langemeier
said.
“We’re at the point a lot
of people need to replace the
machines they bought 10 or
15 years ago,” he said.
The shortage of equip-
ment has prompted grow-
ers to instead buy farmland,
which has shot up 20% in
value since last year, Lange-
meier said.
“They would buy a lot
more machinery if there
were inventories available,”
he said.
About 40% of farm-
ers recently surveyed as
part of Purdue Universi-
ty’s Ag Economy Barome-
ter reported that insufficient
supplies have impeded their
equipment purchases.
“That’s unprecedented,”
Langemeier said. “Histori-
cally, that would be zero.”
Congress is consider-
ing bills aimed at relieving
port congestion and improv-
ing domestic manufacturing,
with supporters hoping for
bipartisan approval before its
August recess.
Even then, it will take
time to implement the bills
enough to make the supply
chain operate more smoothly,
Eideberg said.
“You can’t turn the
Titanic, as it were, around in
a matter of minutes,” he said.
Some provisions of the
Bipartisan Innovation Act are
aimed at longer-term goals,
such as increasing domestic
manufacturing of semicon-
ductor computer chips, he
said.
“There’s never a bet-
ter time to start than today,”
Eideberg said.
Others
would
have
quicker effects, such as
provisions that reduce tar-
iffs on Chinese compo-
nents and improve options
for manufacturers, he said.
The legislation may also
include labor-related provi-
sions, including Pell grants
for technical education
programs.
“If we don’t have enough
skilled workers, we’re not
going to be able to com-
pete,” Eideberg said, add-
ing there’s been too much
emphasis in the U.S. on
four-year colleges rather
than shorter-term technical
education.
“We’ve attached too
much value on the one at
the expense of the other,” he
said.