A Snowless Snowplow Derby : Caltrans: The spring thaw gives 20 equipment operators time to show off their skills in a Valencia parking lot.

Steve Jimenez, a Caltrans heavy-equipment operator, cut a curve a bit too sharply as he maneuvered a 30-foot-long grader through a tight obstacle course. Over went some traffic cones and a white and orange traffic barricade.

“There goes another Mercedes,” fellow operator David Speers said with a laugh.

Luckily, the Mercedes was imaginary, three barricades taking its place. But Jimenez lost points for his misstep Thursday in the first Snow Roadeo competition for state snowplow drivers.

For a change, it was not a dark and stormy night when they saddled up, but a warm sunny morning in the Magic Mountain parking lot in Valencia.

Twenty California Department of Transportation employees from District 7, which encompasses Los Angeles and Ventura counties, showed off their skill and dexterity in five events, including three obstacle courses, a pre-operation safety inspection and the installation and removal of snow chains on a Caltrans truck.

The two with the highest point total won the right to compete against the best of their brethren in California and Nevada at the first Pacific Snow Removal Conference in Lake Tahoe later this month.

The irony of holding a snowplow competition in 70-degree weather was not lost on the participants. “Snow Roadeo?” Speers asked. “What snow?

Although there was no white stuff, there was plenty of orange. The trucks, the competitors’ shirts and vests, the traffic cones, even the Porta Potties all shone with the familiar Caltrans orange.

The good weather threw off some competitors.

“I’ve never done this when it wasn’t raining in the middle of the night, with the road muddy as hell,” Speers said.

Others found the course intimidating. Roosevelt McCord Jr. admitted to some pre-competition jitters.

“When I first got here and looked at the course, I thought, ‘Man, this is tight!’ ” he said. “But it’s a little more fun now.”

But some scoffed at the challenge.

“We probably get into tighter situations on the road than we do on this course,” said Newhall maintenance yard worker Pat Morgan, whose duties include keeping the Grapevine clear of snow and mud in inclement weather. “Especially on 126. That’s a rough road to work on.”

Robert Holt had a rough time with the truck plow obstacle course, in which he had to maneuver the standard Caltrans truck, a 25-foot-long, 8-ton dump truck with a 10-foot-wide plow mounted on the front, through a course with several sharp turns. Along the way, he tried to gain points by gently nudging out of place strategically placed gallon plastic jugs filled with water, while leaving untouched the nearby orange cones to avoid penalties.

He also ran another course in a skip-loader, its bucket filled with water. Drivers were penalized for the amount of water that sloshed out.

Oh, yes, he was also being timed.

The tests reflect skills needed by snowplow drivers, who must be able to maneuver with delicate precision in difficult situations, scraping off all the snow possible while avoiding oncoming vehicles, and sparing parked cars and roadside signs.

Holt carefully observed the 15 m.p.h. speed limit along the straightaway, but into the first turn, he ran into trouble.

“I think I just took out about four cones,” he muttered. He glanced at his side mirror. “Yep.”

After completing the course, he shook his head with resignation as he climbed down from the cab.

“I blew that one,” he said.

Holt was down, but not out. “It’s kind of new to us,” he told the referees after he received his time. “But I think as time goes by, they’re going to be hearing from District 7!”

A snowplow driver’s lot is not an easy one, several drivers said, recounting stories of abuse they received, including being targets for debris thrown from passing cars. Sometimes drivers deliberately swerve toward them, they said.

“People cuss you out, people flip you off. We’re just trying to do our job,” Jimenez said.

“I got punched in the face about 15 years ago--a guy I was trying to help,” Morgan said. “I don’t do that anymore.”

Shortly after noon, two winners were announced: Robert Pence of the Ventura maintenance yard, and Michael Eul of the Chilao Mountain Crew in the Angeles National Forest. Pence, seemingly speechless from his victory, kept muttering “this is great,” as friends and competitors came up to congratulate him. But then, the reality of the trip to the finals began to sink in.

“Tahoe?” he asked. “What’ll I do with my kids?”

Organizers pronounced the day a success, and they are already making plans for next year. This year’s contestants had suggestions for events to make the competition a little more realistic.

“We need a couple of old ladies parked on the side of the road” to act as obstacles, Speers said.

“Or how much mud you can plow into a car window,” he joked.