Australia’s best truck driver crowned by Scania

Australia's best truck driver crowned by Scania

27 year old David Whyte was crowned Australia's best truck driver at the Young
Australian Truck Driver 2007 final, taking place in Sydney past weekend. 
David Whyte is the first champion in Scania driver competitions 2007 taking
place in close to 40 countries on five continents, aimed at identifying the
world's best truck drivers.

The driver competitions is a part of Scania's global initiative to help raise
the status of professional drivers and emphasise their great importance to both
road safety and the profitability of transport companies.  

David Whyte, from the Melbourne suburb of Glenhuntly, won the crown of Young
Australian Truck Driver 2007 - and a brand new Scania truck - from 16 other
finalists in a competition designed to test for instance their precision driving
skills and road behaviour.  

“People's perceptions of truck drivers need to change. We are professional
people who enjoy what we do and love driving. However, there is a need for
greater understanding and tolerance on the roads by all drivers,” said David
Whyte, who has been driving trucks for the past eight years

More than 1500 young Australian truck drivers had entered the nationwide
competition. The competition has been undertaken by the Australian Trucking
Association and Scania with the support of Shell, Continental Tyres, National
Transport Insurance, Freighter and Fleetmark. 

The most recent round of the world's largest competition for heavy truck drivers
was held in 2005 and attracted 30,000 contestants from 26 European countries as
well as Argentina, Brazil, Taiwan and South Africa. Also competing in the 2007
competition, in addition to Australia, will be South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore,
Botswana, Namibia and Tanzania. In Europe, Bulgaria has been added to the
participating countries. The African countries, Malaysia and Singapore will also
invite bus and coach drivers to compete for the title of best bus driver in
their countries.  

In addition to the competition rounds, Scania is organising road safety seminars
in the participating countries, many of these in partnership with the World
Health Organisation (WHO). Scania will be represented at WHO's First United
Nations Global Road Safety Week, 23-29 April 2007, and also at EU's Road Safety
Day in Brussels on 27 April.
Portraits of the winner David Whyte are available on Scania's homepage.


For further information, please contact Hans-Åke Danielsson, Press Manager,
tel +46 8 553 856 62, e-mail hans-ake.danielsson@scania.com 



Scania is one of the world's leading manufacturers of trucks and buses for heavy
transport applications, and of industrial and marine engines. A growing
proportion of the company's operations consists of products and services in the
financial and service sectors, assuring Scania customers of cost-effective
transport solutions and maximum uptime. Employing 32,800 people, Scania operates
in about 100 countries. Research and development activities are concentrated in
Sweden, while production takes place in Europe and South America, with
facilities for global interchange of both components and complete vehicles. In
2006, invoiced sales totalled SEK 70.7 billion and the net income amounted to
SEK 5.9 billion. 


Scania press releases are available on the Internet at www.scania.com