For Terry Hagedorn, there is significant weight he must take on.

The man who operates a business out of Thompson that primarily provides high-performance engines nationally for drag racing, truck or tractor pulling, dirt track racing, performance boat engines and ground pounding pump gas motors for street cars has made a name for himself in high-performance competition. 

Hagedorn won his 11th national truck or tractor pulling championship this past weekend at the Mexico Young Farmers Truck and Tractor Pull at the Audrain County Fairgrounds with his pro modified four-wheel drive truck “Gunpowder and Lead.” Along his side this past weekend and the various Pro Pulling League national competitions this season was his five-person team, which includes his wife, Sheila.

“It takes a village to win,” Hagedorn said with a chuckle. “We have NASCAR-like radios so they can talk to me when I’m in the vehicle, and I can talk to them. We have part of our crew members at the far end of the track, watching track conditions and where the ruts are at, if they’re getting the ruts packed and if the dirt conditions are changing.”

As Hagedorn explains, it is a motorsport with many concerns during every 15-18 second run and for the countless hours before and after. Pulling a motorsport that emphasizes strength over speed since it involves pulling a sled with weight that is mechanically winched forward as it moves along the course that is more than 300 feet long and 30 feet wide. That weight progressively increases from about 15,000 pounds to 60,000 pounds as each vehicle tries to pull as far as it possibly can.

In the Champions Tour series that ended this past weekend with a rare national event in Mexico, Hagedorn said he only needed to avoid last place to take the championship, and he had already locked up the Western series. He is grateful for everybody’s roles in helping him win another national title.

“I’m 66 years old, and it’s getting harder every year to do this,” Hagedorn said. “We haven’t always had all of this help. For years, it was just me and my wife. We’ve had people come and go that traveled with us, but it just helps me do my job and I appreciate everything they do. They made a championship season a lot more possible.”

It takes manpower to load two at-most 6,350 pound trucks a day before an event and then to weigh the trucks the day of events, Hagedorn said. There are quite a bit of essential tasks that might not be considered initially. 

A member of Hagedorn’s team, Valerie Brightwell, said she has been involved with Hagedorns since last year after getting “hooked” by attending some pulling competitions. Her husband, Shannon, has known them for 36 years.

“My husband, Shannon, my oldest son Joe, and myself have been to every pull with them this year,” Brightwell said. “We have traveled to several states, and we all have jobs being part of the crew. We all enjoy what we do and enjoy the time we have with Terry and Sheila.”

Hagedorn has been pulling for about 40 years. He did it as a hobby at first, competing in local competitions and gaining some notoriety that way but the sport became much more important to him. The former GM technician said he discovered that he preferred working on high-performance engines and other matters in that area so the sport became a way to promote his Hagedorn Racing Engines business, which has existed since 1980. 

“I quit working on everyday vehicles,” Hagedorn said. “I went into high-performance only. It didn’t take me too long to realize people have money for what they want to spend it on. I’m just going to do what I know how to do best and build high-performance motors.”

Hagedorn moved to national competition in 1995 and won a national title in the National Tractor Pulling Association in his debut year along with rookie of the year and other honors. He said he won two national titles in Outlaw Truck and Tractor Pulling before entering into the Pro Pulling League.

Before Hagedorn could find his success, he said he realized how much people are willing to do, specifically how much they are willing to spend, to improve. Someone who complains about needing something for their everyday car might be more willing to spend $25,000 on a high-performance engine, for example. He admits to being competitive and wanted to know how other vehicles were better than his to accomplish much on the national stage.

“It’s a challenge of trying to take a vehicle you actually build from ground up and competing with it and beating 98 percent of the people in the U.S.,” Hagedorn said. “We started out just doing it for fun, but then I didn’t like getting beaten. I don’t care if you’re playing baseball or soccer or football or golf. If you are out there doing it, you would like to do well. They do give trophies for participation, but that doesn’t pay for $100,000 motors.”

Hagedorn describes his wife as even more competitive than him and was one of a few female drivers back in the day. If she wanted to drive for the team nowadays, he said she absolutely could and is considering whether she should in the future. 

For the good of the team, Hagedorn said they ultimately decided it would be most advantageous for him to be the driver and for her to be his coach and guide while on the track. They were able to arrive at a decision together like they did at the beginning when Hagedorn was into drag racing and she was into rodeo.

“We were going in two different directions on the weekends,” Hagedorn said. “That wasn’t working too well. She didn’t like drag racing, and I didn’t care for rodeo. We were building motors for people that were already in the (pulling) sport. That was fun, and we liked it.”

Hagedorn said she is in charge of making sure the vehicle is weighed, that he is wearing all of his protective gear like a fire suit, gloves and a neck brace, and that he is strapped in properly to avoid dangers on the track like flying parts. Primarily, during runs, he said she is on the radio guiding him. 

With Hagedorn tightly strapped in, she is standing in front giving him instructions where to go on the track. After many interactions like this, it has become clear how the couple is in sync.

“You have to drive it according to track conditions,” Hagedorn said. “She is clueing me in to what I’m doing while I’m driving it. A lot of the time, we’ve been doing it so long, we’re pretty well on the same page. Most of the time, I’m already doing it when she says it now.”

Hagedorn said he has become accustomed to national attention like when some events are broadcasted on CBS. This attention comes from the success credited to his name, but he said the credit also belongs to his wife and the other members of his team. They are why he can still be so confident after many years.

“It’s not uncommon for me to win a national deal,” Hagedorn said. “We’ve done it, and we’re still doing it.”