“My truck bearing the MAN lion is a blast”

The country needs young drivers – so it’s great that Leon Eckardt is yet another young man for whom being a trucker is one of the most enjoyable occupations in the world. He has been driving his MAN truck since the autumn.

Leon Eckardt is 21 years old and has been driving trucks professionally for Maxit since October. The fact that he would one day end up making a living behind the wheel of a truck was clear from his childhood. “I decided to be the third generation of the family in this profession,” Leon says, explaining how he also took up a career as a professional driver, following in his grandfather’s and father’s footsteps. “My reason for choosing this profession was that it was the family business.”

“I love the freedom it offers, talking with colleagues, working with large diesel trucks and facing new challenges every day,” continues Leon, and there are plenty of the latter on his assignments in construction site traffic. In addition to extremely narrow or steep access roads and uneven terrain, the 21-year-old also has to deal with placing down silos time and again. He explains that some of the silos need to be placed on surfaces that are hard to assess.

“It’s amazing how varied, exciting, challenging and interesting it is to position silos,”

is how the driver from the town of Coburg in the Upper Franconia region of south-western Germany sums it up.

He delivers plaster, screed and masonry mortar to construction sites every day on behalf of his employer, Maxit. “I think that as a beginner driver, though, I’ve proven myself really well so far and made a name for myself. I’m proud of how I deal with the challenges I face every day.”

The overall concept is just right

Leon has been able to start his career in a MAN truck and is very happy about it. He says that while his MAN TGS 35.440 with a silo placing unit assembly is no longer the latest model, it’s still nice to drive. “It’s an excellent vehicle to start with,” says Leon happily before becoming a little wistful since that truck will be leaving the company in the spring.

He is not only impressed by the overall concept of MAN vehicles, he also likes how they sound and their design. So it is no surprise that one of his future hopes is related to these trucks bearing the MAN lion: “I’d like to drive more MAN vehicles for my employer in the future.”