September 11, 2016
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Tom Evans (above) of Tiverton has qualified to compete at the World Plowing Championships in Kenya, December, 2017. Now, the fund-raising begins to help get him there with his tractor and plow.
Plowing at the Bruce County Plowing Match, Sept. 2, Evans said it was very satisfying to win the Canadian Plowing Championship, with his 1979 Massey Ferguson 265 tractor and reversible plow. He purchased his tractor and plow nine years ago, and has been show-plowing competitively ever since.
This was his first time at the national championships, held in Ottawa at the end of August. "You had to be first or second in Ontario to qualify," he said, "and I did that at the International Plowing Match last year."
Evans is quite excited to head to Kenya next December for the world championships.
"It's a real accomplishment to be deemed good enough to represent your country," he said. "I'm thrilled to be the first person from Bruce County to win at the Canadian championships, and the first to move on to the worlds. It'll be an accomplishment, itself, just to get there (to Kenya), but I will be proud to represent Canada."
Later at the plowing match, as he stood at the microphone with his trophy, Evans said the win really hasn't sunk in, completely. "I'm hoping to make everybody proud. I look forward to representing all of you and all of Canada on the world stage."
Evans works as a CAD (computer-aided design) designer at Britespan Building Systems in Lucknow. His father, Irwin Evans, still works the family's 200-acre farm north of Tiverton.
John Gillespie, secretary-treasurer of the Bruce County Plowmen's Association, estimates it will cost about $30,000 to send Evans and his plowing equipment to the worlds, so it will be a regional fund-raising effort.
Tom Evans (left) at the Bruce County Plowing Match, Sept. 2, with John Gillespie holding the trophy that Evans won at the Canadian Plowing Championships for reversible plowing
Written ByLiz Dadson is the founder and editor of the Kincardine Record and has been in the news business since 1986.
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