Cover Feature: By Daniel J. Linss company that offered him a job hauling cows and milk locally, but not in a big rig. However, it was a driving job, so he took it. Not long after that, he ended up at Brazil Trucking, a hay-hauling outfit out of Hanford, CA, and began driving a 2-axle Peterbilt 386, pulling doubles, and focused on learning the ropes as fast as possible. Hauling hay throughout the Central Valley in California, the company saw Rene’s extensive efforts to learn and take care of their equipment, so they moved him into a cool Peterbilt 379 with CAT power, along with a set of air-ride trailers, and he took care of that combo as if it were his own! Then covid hit, and everything slowed down. Always wanting to have his own truck and run his own business, Rene began scrimping and saving. Money was tight because there was not a lot of work, but equipment was also cheap, so he was looking to take advantage of that fact. By the end of 2020, he had saved enough money to buy a plain white 2015 Kenworth T680, but he had no idea what he was going to do with it or what he was going to haul. Renting a trailer from one of his uncles, Rene formed Double R Trucking and started finding his own loads and taking a few “extra” runs from his uncles. At first, Not everyone has stacks of cash laying around or money to spend on expensive truck builds, but that doesn’t mean you can’t have a cool ride. Young Rene Camacho (26) of Madera, CA proves that fact with his custom Freightliner Cascadia, built in a short amount of time with limited resources, that still caught our eye for a feature – and not just any old feature, a cover feature! Rene and his family, who he works closely with, have mastered the art of “Ballin’ on a Budget” with their trucks. And we couldn’t be more excited about him or his small fleet of daily workhorses that look great, too. Born in 1998 and raised in Firebaugh, a small community in California’s Central Valley, Rene did not grow up in a trucking family. He did, however, have a couple uncles who were truckers, with nice equipment, which was just enough to spark his interest later on when it came time to pick a career. Rene and one of his brothers loved to go over to their uncle’s house, who had a nice 2005 Peterbilt 379, and play around with the trucks. But let’s not jump ahead. After his parents went through a difficult divorce when Rene was not very old, he and his four siblings, along with their mother, struggled to survive. Rene is the second oldest of the five kids – four boys and one girl – but his older brother wasn’t handling things well, so Rene was forced to step up and grow up fast. His siblings include older brother Julio (29), younger brothers Alex (24) and Bernardo (20), and sister Kaitlyn (17). When not in school, Rene started working out in the fields at just 14 years old, and would give all his paychecks to his mother, to help pay the bills. That’s a pretty responsible and “grown up” thing for a 14-year-old teenager to do, which gives you a little insight as to the work ethic and morals of this fine young man. In high school, Rene got really involved with sports, especially football, and he was good (and whatever he lacked in talent he more than made up for with effort and dedication). He strived to be a leader, both on and off the field, and his efforts did not go un-noticed. After graduating from high school at just 17 years old, Rene got a football scholarship to play for a smaller college in Kansas and then moved there shortly after graduation. Times were good in Kansas – he ate well, lived in a nice place, played a lot of football, and did not have to deal with the daily stresses and struggles he was so used to back home. Majoring in Criminology, Rene thought he might want to one day become a police officer. Unfortunately, things were not going well for the rest of his family back home, and this began to eat away at Rene’s happiness – he began to feel guilty for not being there to help like he had been in the past, and for how easy he had it in Kansas. So, at 18 years old, he made another “responsible” but tough decision to leave school and go home after less than a year in Kansas. Coming from nothing, Rene was determined to build a better life for himself, his mother, and his siblings, so he scraped up enough money to attend truck driving school and got his CDL at 18 years old. But what he quickly realized was that getting his CDL was not the hard part – the hard part was getting that first job. After applying everywhere he could think of, he finally got a call back from a local cattle 10 10-4 Magazine / July 2025 BALLIN’ ON A BUDGET
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjA1MjUy