Kaspul Anwar bin Abdul Karim who drives for Prifaria Sdn Bhd has been crowned the champion in this year's Malaysian leg of the Volvo Trucks Fuelwatch Challenge 2017. He will be headed to Sweden for the World Finals and will be going against the best from all over the world in one, if not the most popular annual truck drivers competition throughout the world. Second place went to En Firdaus bin Salim from Swift Logistics Sdn Bhd and third place, to En Ahmad Sulaiman from Konsortium PD.
This is the eighth time the Malaysian edition of the Volvo Fuelwatch challenge and even after so many years of intense competition, there are still some notable moments in this year's competition.
This year's competition saw the first time a lady driver reach the Malaysian finals. Puan Junaidah bte Ibrahim represented Benua Haulage Sdn Bhd and made truck driving history by being the first woman to reach the Malaysian finals. Its a big thing in a very male oriented market (there are a lot of lady bus drivers, but not as many truck drivers, especially those driving prime movers). Even though, she did not make into the top three places, it is still a great achievement for any truck driver to have made it this far.
I hope that she will carry on competing as she shows potential. With the right coaching methods, I heard that she would go far. I do hope she is reading this and carry on competing as I know that women drivers overseas have actually won their country Fuelwatch Challenge (Louise Marriott, Australia, 2015). So keep on going for gold!
L to R - Nor Rahmat b. Abd Talib, Kaspul Anwar, Jamal Embong and Zulkifli Saad
The second big thing is Prifaria Sdn Bhd. The Malaysian Fuelwatch champion for the past three years have come from this company. Kaspul joins Nor Rahmat Bin Abd Talib who was champion in 2015 and Zulkifli bin Saad, champion in 2016 (who actually won on his first time entering this competition). This is a hat trick of sorts for the haulage company who seems to have the knack of giving rise to great truck drivers. The company, who have been in the oil and gas haulage industry for many years emphasizes safety in all aspects and it could be clearly proven to be quite true because of the quality of its drivers competing.
Do note that this year, Prifaria had two drivers in the finals with Jamal bin Embong being the other competitor. I also think that having past champions benefited the two drivers - Nor Rahmat was actually their coach for the competition (and company rep at the award ceremony too).
This year's Fuelwatch is full of milestones. After eight years there are still some surprises. One other little twist in this year's plot is that at the gala dinner and award ceremony, the Fuelwatch judges were actually sitting down on a platform looking at the stage like the judges from American Idol or something like that. The past few years it was just the usual eat, drink, play some games and be merry before the winner is announced. So this time it was slightly different. They actually had the chance to speak their minds on the finalists. One or two of them had some tough words for the competitors too. I suppose this is also for the benefit of those who have been attending over and over again (like Yours Truly).
It was a good event. There were a lot of familiar faces and new ones too. One of the past winners also mentioned to me that competitions like these is how a driver can gauge their performance and skill aside from sharpening and adding knowledge. It does keep them on their toes and it does help them see where they stand and what would their next step be. So the Volvo Trucks Fuelwatch Challenge may be eight years old in Malaysia, but it is one of the peaks that a truck driver would need to reach. It also builds skill and human capital.
With that I hope that the competition would continue for many years to come and that truck drivers (via their companies) would continue to participate.
The finalists for 2017 were:
Ruslan Ab Ghani from Perwakilan Cekap Sdn Bhd (Port Klang), Jamal B. Embong from Prifaria Sdn Bhd (Kuantan), Ahmad Sulaiman from Konsortium PD Sdn Bhd (Port Klang), Mohd Sufian bin Sahari from Multimodal Freight Sdn Bhd (Port Klang), Kaspul Anwar bin Abdul Karim from Prifaria Sdn Bhd (Prai), Tan Eng Hin from Lima Bintang Logistics Sdn Bhd (Prai) and Firdaus bin Salim from Swift Logistics Sdn Bhd (Johor Bahru).Junaidah Bte Ibrahim Benua Haulage Sdn Bhd,
Two past winners - En Rahmat & En Ahmad Othman
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