History could be made at the annual national excavator operator competition as three women compete to be the first female to win the title.
Georgia Lyford from Canterbury-Westland, Lydia Hill from Nelson-Marlborough and Tanya Claxton from Hawke's Bay-East Coast will be among the 12 competitors battling it out at Feilding's Manfeild Park during the Central Districts Field Days from March 13-15.
Lyford from Schick Civil Construction in Christchurch is the youngest of the trio and dedicated her qualifying win in Canterbury-Westland's regional event to other young women.
"I'm only 23 so it will be cool to go to the finals in Feilding and prove to all the other young girls considering a career in civil construction that we can do it too," she said.
Blenheim-based Hill - who learnt how to operate excavators on her family's farm when she was 14 - has been working on large projects like the new Whale Trail from Picton to Kaikōura.
She said it was "mindboggling" women had never competed at the nationals before.
"I'm super excited - the boys have got to watch out this year."
In its 31-year history, a woman has never even made it to the finals.
Claxton, the Hawke's Bay-East Coast regional champ, is feeling quietly confident going into the nationals.
This year's tasks are secret, but previous years' competitors have had to slamdunk a basketball with an excavator bucket, paint, pour a cup of tea, and scoop an egg up without breaking it.
Unfortunately, the egg was a task Claxton couldn't crack.
"Only two of the guys got it, I was close but it sort of rolled off," she said.
"I like those things, they're fun because those aren't things you do on a day-to-day basis, you don't go round picking up eggs or opening beer bottles on a job site."
Now she's a foreperson and has been in the same industry for 23 years.
For most of her career in construction she's been the only woman on machinery on job sites.
"Back when I started, it was sort of unheard of for females to be on machinery, and until probably the last two years I've been the only female in my depot on machinery.
"My operations manager Lily, put me forward when I was overseas and she thought it would be good to put me out there and said 'you can do it, show them that girls can do anything'."
