A 24-hour ploughing marathon was recently held to raise funds for Willie Grieve from Perth who is travelling to the World Ploughing Championships in October.
The event, organised by the Highlands of Fife Ploughing Association, took place at Fordelhill near Leuchars, in Fife, by kind permission of James Orr and family.
Willie, who has ploughed competitively since 1975, is a past chairman of the association and his wife Jill, is the current secretary.
“Willie has been a great supporter of our association for many years, having served on the committee since its resurrection in 2009 and spending eight of those years as chairman,” said Steven Eccles.
“His devotion to ploughing sees Willie travel the length and breadth of Scotland most weekends during match season, competing and gaining experience in as many matches as possible.”
Willie’s commitment paid off at the 2022 Scottish Ploughing Championships when he was crowned both the Scottish Conventional and Overall World Style champion, qualifying for the world event later this year.
The marathon commenced at 11am on the Saturday morning and saw local ploughmen work right through until 11am the following morning.
Four tractors were supplied by local dealerships including R&R Machinery, George Colliar Ltd, Fife Tractors and J Low Agri Services Ltd, while Netherton Tractors supplied a subsoiler.
This is Willie’s first time competing at the world event, having judged on two occasions and travelled to different countries to spectate.
He will represent Scotland in the conventional section alongside reversible winner, James Tait from Caithness.
This year’s 68th World Ploughing Championships will take place in Latvia on 14 and 15 October.
A Just Giving page has been set up to support Willie on his 10-day trip:
https://justgiving.com/crowdfunding/HOFPA-ploughing-marathon
All the proceeds will be donated to Willie to help with the cost of not only getting himself to Latvia but also the considerable cost of transporting his tractor and plough across Europe.