Hold your horses — in a change of pace from normal, Mounties found themselves involved in a very slow-speed chase.

About 3:40 p.m. on Tuesday, RCMP were sent to a break-and-enter complaint at a rural address on Hwy. 595 east of Red Deer in which firearms and other items were snatched.

Later, about 5:10 p.m., Mounties were called about a John Deere 6400 tractor with a front-end bucket being stolen from a property a few kilometres from the break-and-enter complaint.

“The owner of that tractor was watching it being driven away,” said Cpl. Barry Larocque with Blackfalds RCMP.

Mounties began following the movements of the tractor as it drove through fields, crashing through farmers’ fences and trees.

One of the officers stopped a nearby snowmobiler.

“He asked if the snowmobile operator would let him jump on the back and follow these tracks to see if we could find where the tractor had gone,” said Larocque.

Eventually the tractor was spotted, going what Larocque estimates was about 8-10 km/h.

“It was very slow, there wasn’t any speed to this incident,” he said.

Mounties say about 6:45 p.m., the tractor stalled while going up a hill.

The officer who had hitched a ride on the snowmobile started approaching the tractor to make an arrest.

The tractor driver then tried to back the machine down the hill, but lost control and the tractor rolled backward, doing a complete revolution, according to police.

Larocque said the driver, who police later learned had no experience driving tractors, was not injured and was taken into custody.

The tractor, however, suffered extensive damage.

In the cab of the tractor, police found firearms and other property allegedly taken during the earlier break and enter incident.

Larocque said as far as he knows, in the history of his detachment, this is the only event of its type.

“There’s been no pursuits of a tractor through the fields of central Alberta before,” he said.

Jesse Cecka, 25, of no fixed address has been charged with break, enter and theft, theft over $5,000, breach of existing court documents and multiple counts of mischief.

He had been arrested March 28 on after allegedly being found with a vehicle stolen from Red Deer.’

He had been released on conditions, said Larocque.

Cecka is scheduled to appear in court on April 3.

jenna.mcmurray@sunmedia.ca

On Twitter: @SUNJMac