AURELIUS - A rodeo came to Cayuga County last week, but it was no traditional hee-hawing roundup.

Hard hats and tan work boots replaced cowboy hats and spurs. Mechanical whirring and ear-piercing beeping of vehicles backing up drowned out the sound of any horses on nearby farms. And the ubiquitous lasso was conspicuously absent and substituted by heavy steel.

Oh yes, there was a rodeo in the parking lot in front of the Cayuga-Onondaga Board of Cooperative Educational Services campus in Aurelius last Friday. A heavy equipment rodeo.

Students from three BOCES' heavy equipment programs in central New York - the Tompkins-Seneca-Tioga, Madison-Oneida and Cayuga-Onondaga BOCES - congregated on West Genesee Street Road to go head-to-head in five timed contests judged in safety, speed, precision and skill.

“It's a friendly competition between three schools,” heavy equipment instructor Darryl Jirinec said, “and we're really giving students a chance to show what they've learned

throughout the year and have fun. That's the big thing.”

And that is certainly what the day meant to students, who entered contests such as the Baseball Toss - a competition in which they used a backhoe to drop baseballs into different PVC pipes - or used a tablespoon affixed to a backhoe's finger to pick up an egg in the Egg Pick.

With just a few months left before graduation, Austin Lee, 18, of Cato used the rodeo to get in some extra practice in hopes of landing a job in the industry.

“It's getting me prepared for the future,” he said, “I want an excavator job, so this gives me experience with all the machines.”

Added Tom Gulliver, 18, of Union Springs, “You learn where you are in the world. You learn where your skills are.”

But neither forgot or ignored the other aspect of the rodeo.

“It's fun,” Lee said. “It gets us out of school and gets us doing something we like.”

This year was the second time Cayuga-Onondaga BOCES hosted its own rodeo. For years, students traveled to Williamsport, Pa. for the Pennsylvania College of Technology's heavy equipment rodeo. And while they will continue to do that, Jirinec and his assistant teacher, Susan Burnett, decided to organize one locally to get more people in central New York involved.

“We decided, 'Gee, it would be nice to do something close by so schools that can't go to Pennsylvania could interact,'” Jirinec said.

Judges stood at each station, and contest winners received prizes donated by local companies. But everyone that came out on Friday left as winners, as Ohio Technical College in Cleveland provided $1,500 scholarships to all that participated.

The day couldn't have been better for Steve Kreydatus, 18, of Montezuma, who basked in the warm weather and did something he enjoys.

“In my honest opinion, I wouldn't take another class,” he said. “It's the class with the most hands-on work. And we have an awesome teacher.”

Added friend Steve Vannorstrand, 16, of Port Byron, “It's a lot fun and it gives people the experience to compete and show off what they have.”

Staff writer Alyssa Sunkin can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 239 or alyssa.sunkin@lee.net