When Deidrea Pickett bought her Tesla Model 7 in December 2024, she had no idea it would place her in the middle of a worldwide competition that would take her on a 10,000-mile road trip across many states in just three short weeks.
Pickett loves to travel and frequently takes road trips. In just over a year, she logged more than 90,000 miles. What she did not know was that every stop she made at a different supercharging station was one stop closer to winning a worldwide contest. She was unintentionally competing against at least 7 million other Tesla owners.
The contest ran from Jan. 1 through Dec. 31, 2025, but participants were not informed it was happening until Dec. 9, just 22 days before it ended. The goal was to see who visited the most unique supercharging stations in one year. Each station only counted once.
“You had to have already had a bunch of trips in to be able to even win this thing. I already had a lot, like 133,” said Pickett.
After the announcement, Pickett and her husband, Nicholas, began searching online forums and Facebook groups to see how many charging stations other drivers had visited. They found only one person who shared that they had over 200 stops.
“So, we thought, we have a chance to win this,” she said. “Let’s set out a mission and let’s go.”
Pickett mapped out charging stations that were feasible to reach before the end of the year. She and her 7-year-old son, Easton, hit the road, traveling to cities including New Orleans, Chicago, Oklahoma City and Austin. They hit any superchargers along the way.
“I mapped out all of the ones that were in Houston and I just checked them off as I went,” she said. “Then I went to San Antonio and hit all of them up there. Really, the only ones that I missed were if they were out of order.”
Throughout her three-week trip, Pickett had no way of knowing where she stood in the competition. There was no leaderboard or running total. While the vehicle’s app registered each station she visited, everyone else’s standings were only visible if they chose to share them.
Pickett finished the contest with 400 unique charging station visits, placing third worldwide.
From Dec. 9 through Dec. 31 alone, she logged roughly 10,000 miles. In her first year of ownership, she traveled more than 90,000 miles.
“I probably couldn’t have done this without full self-driving,” Pickett said. “You just hit a button, and it takes you there. You don’t have to think, you don’t have to drive. You just have to look at the road.”
She said she programmed destinations into the system, and the vehicle handled the rest.
The trip was not without minor challenges, though. Near Shreveport, Louisiana, the self-driving system began malfunctioning late at night.
“That was a challenge. I thought I was going to have to give up then that the mission was over,” she said.
She also drove into a snowstorm in Chicago that slowed her down and forced her to skip several stops. Being from Kentucky, she was not used to all the snow.
“It [driving] wasn’t as bad as I thought. The only thing that slowed me down in the snow was the me driving part because I was scared,” she said.
By finishing third in the contest, Pickett earned free supercharging for the life of the vehicle. In 2025, she spent about $5,700 on charging costs. The gas equivalent to that is $11,000.
Pickett said she had planned to purchase a newer model this year, but after winning the contest, she decided to keep her current one. She is now advocating for a supercharging station to be installed in Columbia so she can take full advantage of her winnings.
“I just think the coolest thing about this is that everybody was automatically entered,” she said. “You didn’t have a choice.”
By Amy Pike
amy@adairvoice.com
