Krysten Anderson carries on family’s Grave Digger legacy in Monster Jam Triple Threat Series

Krysten Anderson is a true triple threat.

She’s a talented artist, can serve up a mean plate of pancakes and, most notably, can handle the 12,000-pound Grave Digger monster truck with ease.

As a driver on the Monster Jam Triple Threat Series, she’s a triple threat in another way too, driving the Grave Digger monster truck, ATV and speedster.

The daughter of Dennis Anderson, creator and flagship driver of Grave Digger, considered by many to be one of the most iconic monster trucks in the world, Anderson is following in her father’s footsteps.

The Monster Jam Triple Threat Series takes over the Spokane Arena for four shows, Friday through Sunday.

The Monster Jam Triple Threat Series also features the following drivers:

Armando Castro in El Toro Loco; Cynthia Gauthier in Monster Mutt Dalmatian; Camden Murphy, 2017 Rookie of the Year, in Pirate’s Curse; Bernard Lyght in Alien Invasion; Tristan England, winner of the Monster Jam World Finals 2017 Double Down Showdown, in EarthShaker; Travis Groth in Megalodon; and Tyler Groth in Zombie.

The Pirate’s Curse, Alien Invasion, EarthShaker and Megalodon Monster Jam Triple Threat teams are all new to Spokane.

Anderson didn’t intend to take up the family business exactly. She planned to study graphic design in college then get a job with Monster Jam designing the trucks.

Between high school and college though, the folks at Monster Jam called and asked if she wanted to test in the truck.

“It was one of those things where you didn’t want it to be a ‘What if?’… ” she said. “Before I went to college, I wanted to be 100 percent sure that I was making the right choice.”

Anderson tried her hand driving the truck and had a blast. She told the people at Monster Jam she was interested and got a spot behind the wheel, making her the first female Grave Digger driver in the truck’s 35-year history and the fourth Anderson to drive the iconic rig.

“It worked out that way that they needed something fresh and they needed something new and I think a female face for Grave Digger was perfect,” she said.

Before joining Monster Jam, Anderson spent a week at Monster Jam University, where drivers train with monster trucks, ATVS and speedsters before heading out on tour.

While at Monster Jam University, Anderson estimates she, the other drivers and Monster Jam hosts performed eight mock shows in order to get the pacing of the Triple Threat Series down.

“The Triple Threat is so physically demanding,” she said. “It is so fast-paced because we’re switching from the truck to the four-wheeler to the speedster to the truck and back again so we had to learn that routine and make the shows fast because we don’t want people sitting in the seats for four hours like ‘Oh my god, what is next?’ ”

The drivers also practiced a new element of the Triple Threat Series, the two-wheel skills competition, which is taking the place of last year’s wheelie competition.

Before her first Monster Jam appearance last year, Anderson said she had her fair share of rookie nerves and didn’t want to let anyone down.

She said she tripped and stumbled in her first couple of shows. After after her dad and brothers, who also drive Grave Digger, told her to enjoy herself and have fun, a flip switched.

“I started standing on my own two feet after that,” she said. “I started winning. I started kicking butt. I started kicking the boys’ butts. It was crazy. I think that big hurdle of getting past the nerves and getting past psyched out, like ‘Oh my god, I’m driving Grave Digger. This is a big deal.’ After I got over that, things sailed more smoothly for me.”

In the Triple Threat Series, Anderson and the other drivers handle monster trucks, ATVs and speedsters.

Anderson enjoys all three sections of the show, although she said monster trucks have a special place in her heart.

She approaches each vehicle with a similar mindset, noting that most four-wheeled vehicles respond to the traction of the dirt in the same way.

Dirt is something Anderson never thought she’d be so familiar with.

“I never thought that working for Monster Jam and driving a monster truck that I would study dirt as hard as I do but the dirt has so much to do with how well the show goes that weekend,” she said with a laugh.

At recent shows in Sacramento, Anderson said the tacky, mostly clay dirt provided almost too much traction, making it hard to maneuver the vehicles around the track.

At shows in Tacoma, however, the dirt was really loose, almost sandy, which allowed the monster trucks and four wheelers to drift around the track.

“I’m interested to see the dirt in Spokane because the dirt in Tacoma was great,” she said. “I’ve never been so excited about dirt.”

During the show, Anderson and the other drivers race around the track and execute wheelies, donuts, jumps and other tricks.

In that moment before a truck lands after a jump or a trick, Anderson said the seconds of hang time feel like years.

Sometimes, questions race through Anderson’s mind while she’s suspended: “Is it past vertical? Is it too past vertical? Do I need to put the truck in reverse? Is it going to wreck when it lands?”

But lately, now that’s she more in tune with her truck, she is more calm and notices she doesn’t make as many mistakes as she used to.

“I’d be like ‘I’ve been in this situation. I need to do this here or I need to do that there…’ ” she said. “I think that’s a key to pulling off tricks in a monster truck is staying as calm as you possibly can even when you’re hanging 20 feet in the air.”

The Monster Jam Triple Threat Series runs through early March, and Anderson hopes to tour with Monster Jam in the summer.

When she’s not studying dirt at arenas around the country, Anderson is home with her dad and brothers in Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina, the homebase of Grave Digger.

Dennis Anderson has a Grave Digger shop there, as well as a restaurant, Diggers Diner, where Anderson works as a waitress, often getting recognized by the tourists who stop by.

“It’s Grave Digger 24/7,” she said. “It’s a family affair. If we’re not on the road tearing the trucks up, we’re back at the shop working on them, or I’m up serving pancakes, spilling coffee. It’s a big Anderson machine around there.”