UI hosting three-day logger sports competition

When Rebecca Hamner suits up for her team’s practices and competitions at the University of Idaho, her gear ranges from the ordinary – tennis shoes and a T-shirt – to the extraordinary – an ax and chain saw. As a member of the university’s logger sports club, Hamner’s outfit, except for her jeans, will be about the only traditional sports equipment involved when the university hosts the largest logger sports competition in the Northwest Wednesday through Friday.

The Association of Western Forestry Clubs, which includes nearly 30 teams from as far as Colorado, Nevada and California, hosts an annual forestry contest at a different college every year to kick off its spring season. With events such as ax throwing, pole climbing and power sawing, the 2007 conclave at the University Plant Science Farm off the Troy Highway features more than 17 different forestry sports over the course of the three-day contest.

“We are trying to cater to everybody,” said Rodney Cochrane, a senior in the UI’s forestry program and the logger team’s captain. “It is quite the deal here.”

The natural resource-based competition has drawn the attention of more than just the players, coaches and fans of the sport. ESPN’s college sports channel ESPNU will be there to broadcast from North Idaho’s great outdoors. Representatives of power tool and saw company Stihl will also be on hand for Wednesday’s events to watch as one participant from each forestry club vies for a chance to advance to Stihl’s Timbersport’s collegiate competitions through a myriad of chopping, throwing and other outdoor trials.

“The conclave is the biggest competition of the year,” said Hamner, a 21-year-old junior in UI’s forestry program and a logger sports participant for three years.

Many on the timber team, including Cochrane, come from traditional logging families and grew up in the woods in and around North Idaho. “We are just trying to carry on a tradition,” Cochrane said.

Hamner, however, was like many people uninitiated with the outside-the-mainstream timber sports. A Hayden native, she played the usual sports of volleyball and basketball during her time at Coeur d’Alene High School. Though she was involved with the high school’s forestry club, she didn’t know the first thing about a horizontal chop, the proper technique of a Jack-and-Jill, guy-and-girl-team bucksaw race or any other timber sport for that matter. It wasn’t until her freshman year at Oregon State that Hamner first watched a timber sports competition, where she caught the ax-swinging, log-tossing bug.

“I thought, being a freshman, I wanted to try something new,” Hamner said. And, with the logger sports, she recalled “It was something different. I thought it might be fun.”

Since her transfer to Moscow, Hamner and the rest of the logger team’s more than 30 competitors practice chopping wood, balancing on logs and many other timber-based exercises for 10 hours every week. The participants can compete in any part of the outdoor sports and are encouraged to do as many events as possible.

In a sport dominated by men and often associated with testosterone, Hamner said that her experience, and those of her women teammates, has been a welcome reception.

“The females are always outnumbered by the men,” Hamner said, but, she added, “The teammates are all really helpful.”