Between driving a local route for Anheuser-Busch, spending quality time with his family, and football season, the days are quite full this time of year for Daryus Jones.
Jones is a member of Elite 11 for Transition Trucking’s 2026 Driving For Excellence Award — and the only semifinalist to be nominated by his driving school instructor, Janet Leath of Tulsa Tech’s Professional Driver Training program.
Leath, a military veteran who’s spent time out on the road as an owner-operator, quickly identified strong leadership qualities in Jones that captured her attention as he navigated the work necessary to secure his CDL. Leath was even more impressed as Jones entered the field of professional driving, beginning his run to success as a local driver during his rookie year behind the wheel.
Daryus Jones’ interview video appears below. Readers may also click here to view the video on YouTube or click here to hear an audio-only version.
From the road to the gridiron
Like a quarterback leading his team down the field to score the winning touchdown before the clock runs out, Jones welcomes the responsibility he holds these days to make every minute count in all the work that he does.
Pulling a trailer filled with Anheuser-Busch products across the Tulsa/Broken Arrow metro area, Jones is an early arrival at the company’s distribution center, hitting the road at 5:30 or 6 in the morning with a delivery route that includes stores, restaurants and bars, stocking up for customers as another football season begins to hit its stride.
By early afternoon, four days during the work week, Jones parks his truck and trades his keys for a coach’s whistle. He can always count on his wife, Vanessa, to have his coaching clothes ready for a quick run to the football field, where a group of kids he has led for the past five years will be ready to take their next steps as a team.
“Vanessa has been extremely supportive of everything I’m doing,” said Jones of his wife, whom he considers to be the MVP of their family. “She’s just been amazing throughout, taking care of our home and our kids. I’m very fortunate to have her in my corner, especially with all that we have happening.”
This time of year, Coach Jones enjoys spending the afternoons with his 11-year-old son, Aiden, and a group of kids who have been playing football together since the first grade. Informed by his days in the military and inspired by mentors from his younger days, Jones happily serves as the head coach of Broken Arrow Chrome, a sixth-grade youth football team.
After the weekday practices, which typically run two hours, the dinner bell rings. The evening meal is followed by some family time with Jones’ four kids, who range in age from 2 to 11 years old. On weeknights, it’s an early bedtime as Jones looks forward to repeating the same schedule the next day.
“It’s been awesome to be able to continue to coach these (kids) and watch them progress,” said Jones.
Saturdays are game days for Broken Arrow Chrome, which opened the season with a 1-1 record after the first two weeks of play. While Jones is able to catch his breath a bit on Sundays, he knows that Monday’s alarm will be calling him to another big week throughout the fall.
“We have some long days this time of year, but I love every minute of it,” observed Jones. “My wife and I thought it was important for me to stay close to home, if possible, when I was looking at trucking as a career after the Army.
“I was very fortunate that a buddy of mine knew about the opening with Anheuser-Busch and he got me an interview,” he added. “Being able to stay local and have this schedule has been great. I’ve been coaching a lot of the guys on the team since they were in first grade.”
How the Army opened the door to trucking
When Jones thinks back to his dreams as a teenager — just three years older than his oldest child is now — trucking was not part of his vision for the future. Ironically, it was his duty assignment as a motor transport operator for the Army that allowed Jones to reach one of his earliest envisioned goals in life.
“I wanted to get to Europe and travel around. Now, as a 14-year-old, it’s hard to believe that dream would happen because of trucking — but it did,” recalled Jones. “You could say that I fell in love with trucking during the convoys we had in Europe. I got to spend a lot of time in Poland, and we also went through Germany, Latvia, Estonia and Romania.
“It wasn’t just the sights on the road,” he added. “I fell in love with the whole process involved with trucking. It was just an amazing time. I learned a lot about myself, including how to problem-solve.”
Over his four years in the service, Jones saw himself grow both personally and professionally. In addition, he learned about the essential nature of trucking as it relates to both the military and civilian supply chains.
“The Army changed everything for me. It changed the way that I walked and talked, and my perception on life,” he said. “One of the biggest things I learned in the military is to be 10 minutes prior to the 10 minutes prior — right place, right time, right uniform.
“In the military, we had a saying, ‘Nothing moves without us.’ That’s true to life,” said Jones of the vital role held by professional drivers and supported by an entire industry. “Without trucking, no one’s getting their food, their water and whatever you can name. Truckers are on the road making the world go.”
Dreams, life lessons and keeping it all in perspective
While Jones has some dreams that may someday include exploring what it would take to become an owner-operator, he knows there’s still much more to learn about the trucking industry … and there are also new experiences and lessons to share as a youth football coach.
As he looks at what’s next, Jones is taking time to look back at what his mentors shared with him along the way.
There’s his high school basketball coach, Eric Savage, who Jones noted commanded a room and became a reference point for him during basic training in the Army. More recently, there’s Tulsa Tech’s Leath, who has been checking in with Jones nearly every week since he was named to the Elite 11 in early August.
“She was so excited and so proud,” said Jones of Leath’s initial reaction to his Elite 11 status. “She couldn’t believe it.”
For his part, Jones also holds a level of excitement and anticipation as the Elite 11 will gather this evening (Tuesday, Sept. 22) in Columbus, Ohio, at the National Veterans Memorial and Museum.
Like all the members of the Elite 11, Jones knows that — in addition to celebrating the accomplishments of this year’s semifinalists over the next two days — the Driving For Excellence Award Selection Committee will choose the finalists in the competition. The finalists will return from Ohio one step closer to becoming the professional driver who be presented the keys to a new Kenworth T680 as the winner of the 2026 Driving For Excellence Award.
“Getting together with the Elite 11 will be an awesome opportunity to share with everyone, and whatever happens will happen,” said Jones, before sharing a couple of pieces of wisdom and perspective from his work coaching youth football.
“With our team, we talk about how we want them to be young men who will go out and serve your communities and your future families the right way,” he said. “We also talk to the team about how this is more than a sport at the end of the day. It’s about how you move forward.”
Greg Thompson is an award-winning writer and producer who has worked in the trucking industry in a variety of roles since 1998. With more than a decade’s worth of experience as a journalist prior entering trucking, Greg is the founder and executive producer of PodWheels.com, a podcast network dedicated to spotlighting the trucking industry.
Since 2019, PodWheels has provided specialized coverage of the National Truck Driving and National Step Van Driving Championships. Over its history, the NTDC Podcast Series has provided more than 150 hours of podcast content highlighting the competitors, organizers and volunteers involved with the Truck Driving Championships at both the state and national levels. The NTDC program, which is hosted annually by the American Trucking Associations, has a history that dates back to 1937.
Beginning in 2025, PodWheels was chosen by the ATA to serve as the Official Podcaster for the NTDC. PodWheels’ coverage of the NTDC, including state competitions and other features, is available through RoadToNTDC.com.
