Ponsse orga­nized the Mec­ha­nic Inter­na­tio­nal Com­pe­ti­tion fort the fifth time on June 4–5, 2025 in Iisalmi. A total of 13 com­pe­ti­tors from 12 dif­fe­rent count­ries took part in the final com­pe­ti­tion. Mats Axels­son repre­sen­ting Små­lands Mas­kin & Industri­ser­vice AB from Swe­den won the very tight and even com­pe­ti­tion.

Mec­ha­nic com­pe­ti­tions are held every two years in Iisalmi in coo­pe­ra­tion with the Ylä-Savo Voca­tio­nal Col­lege. The two-day com­pe­ti­tion mea­su­res the skills of mec­ha­nics in 12 dif­fe­rent tasks. Tasks range from mec­ha­nical ins­tal­la­tion and main­te­nance tasks to elect­rical and hydrau­lic fault fin­ding and forest mac­hine infor­ma­tion sys­tems. Also a writ­ten task is inclu­ded. Com­pe­ti­tors have 45 minu­tes to complete each task.

This year Swe­dish Mats Axels­son won an even com­pe­ti­tion with 227.5/330 points. Atte Arola from Kone­huolto P. Kula Oy, Fin­land came second with 223 points and Ernests Mozka, repre­sen­ting Bal­tic Agro Mac­hi­nery, Lat­via was third with 210 points.

“The com­pe­ti­tion was tight, and the win came with a small dif­fe­rence in points. All par­tici­pants are true pro­fes­sio­nals. The com­pe­ti­tion days were surpri­singly chal­len­ging, but at the same time rewar­ding,” thought Axels­son after the win­ner was decla­red.

”In the com­pe­ti­tion, we were not allowed to use a com­pu­ter to ana­lyze faults, but we used secon­dary means to ret­rieve them. This brought an addi­tio­nal chal­lenge com­pa­red to nor­mal eve­ry­day work,” Axels­son recal­led the com­pe­ti­tion tasks.

“Many of our country orga­niza­tions and retai­lers orga­nize qua­li­fying com­pe­ti­tions locally, from which the best mec­ha­nic is invi­ted to the final com­pe­ti­tion in Fin­land. We hope to see more qua­li­fying com­pe­ti­tions in the future,” says Jarkko Kopo­nen, Lea­der of the Glo­bal Tech­nical Trai­ning team and the com­pe­ti­tion direc­tor.

”In order for the com­pe­ti­tion to be fair to all par­tici­pants, they have access to tasks and mate­rials in their native lan­guage and in English. In this way, we also aim to lower the thres­hold for com­pe­ti­tors to par­tici­pate in the com­pe­ti­tion,” says Terho Tans­ka­nen, Senior Mana­ger of Glo­bal Tech­nical Sup­port and one of the com­pe­ti­tion direc­tors.

Com­pe­ti­tion moti­va­tes the deve­lop­ment of pro­fes­sio­nal skills

Com­pe­ti­tion is a good place to learn new things, both through assign­ments and from col­lea­gues. During the com­pe­ti­tion, jud­ges clo­sely moni­tor and eva­luate com­pe­ti­tors’ per­for­mances. Among other things the jud­ges assess occu­pa­tio­nal safety, troubles­hoo­ting skills, wor­king met­hods, abi­lity to fol­low instruc­tions and per­form mac­hine tes­ting in main­te­nance tasks.

Each com­pe­ti­tor recei­ves per­so­nal feed­back on their per­for­mance, as well as a writ­ten job desc­rip­tion to enable lear­ning. Only the three best per­for­mances will be publis­hed in the com­pe­ti­tion, giving each par­tici­pant their own peace­ful space for lear­ning.

” Our goal is to inc­rease the apprecia­tion and recog­ni­tion of mec­ha­nics’ work, as well as to inc­rease moti­va­tion for deve­lo­ping one’s own pro­fes­sio­nal skills. Some of the par­tici­pants in pre­vious com­pe­ti­tions now work, for example, as trai­ners for mec­ha­nics,” Kopo­nen con­ti­nues.

In addi­tion to the com­pe­ti­tion, all par­tici­pants had the oppor­tu­nity to visit the Ponsse fac­tory, and this visit was one of the most antici­pa­ted moments of the whole com­pe­ti­tion event.

Ori­gi­nally natio­nal mec­ha­nic com­pe­ti­tions have grown into inter­na­tio­nal com­pe­ti­tion. The com­pe­ti­tion is inten­ded for Pons­se’s own mec­ha­nics as well as for mec­ha­nics of Ponsse’s cont­rac­tors and resel­lers. From the very begin­ning, the com­pe­ti­tion has been arran­ged in coo­pe­ra­tion with Ylä-Savo Voca­tio­nal Col­lege, which has offe­red sui­table pre­mi­ses for the com­pe­ti­tion in Pel­to­niemi. Ylä-Savo Voca­tio­nal Col­lege is also invol­ved in pre­pa­ring com­pe­ti­tion tasks. These com­pe­ti­tion tasks are later used also as educa­tio­nal mate­rial at the school.