At 6-foot-10 and equipped with an attitude of a new-age cowboy, Natchez native Jason Johnson is not the type of guy get lost in a crowd — or on the road.

So when Discovery Channel producers scouted Johnson at a trucker show in Louisville, Ky., for a reality competition show titled World’s Toughest Truckers, he jumped at the chance to saddle up.

The show’s third of eight episodes will air at 9 p.m. Monday, and though Johnson, who wrapped filming of the elimination style competition in November of last year, is under a gag order — he offered a bit of a tease.

“Put it this way, I wasn’t the first one gone,” Johnson said. “My plan was to be there for the whole dance, which I was.”

The show started with eight other truckers from Australia, Canada, Scotland, Sri Lanka, England and Alabama. An alternate, Shane Smart from Tennessee, replaced another contestant who broke both of his legs during filming, Johnson said.

On the show, Johnson is listed as from Michigan — where he currently lives — but that wasn’t really his decision.

“I’ve been getting razzed about that from my brother (Joseph Johnson Jr.) and his cohorts,” Johnson said.

But in his interviews, Johnson said he loyally represents the South, Mississippi and Natchez.

Each trucker is paired up with another contestant, and the goal is to deliver the load — whether its camels in the desert, wild cows pinned just the day before or oversized buildings — as fast as possible with the cargo in tact.

The show also took Johnson on a trip around the world. They filmed all over the United States, in Brazil, Australia, India, Mongolia, the United Kingdom and British Columbia, he said.

“It was an adventure in it’s own right,” Johnson said. “The experience itself was beautiful.”

Johnson said all the contestants bonded in the beginning, but the competitive premise of the show made it difficult to stay friends.

“We all got along — kind of, sort of, at times — sort of at the beginning — but there’s 150,000 reasons to be first. That’s the main objective,” he said.

The toughest trucker won $150,000 “and bragging rights until the next season,” Johnson added.

Johnson, 38, said his passion for trucking got geared up from his upbringing in Natchez.

The 1992 Natchez High School graduate grew up in Morgantown, he said, where he got his first taste of hauling and loading by working on his family’s farm.

There, he rode horses, participated in rodeos, hauled hay, chased cows and grew up logging with his father, Joseph Johnson Sr., and his brother.

“That’s how I believe I got the bug, so to speak,” Johnson said.

Johnson spent five years in the Army and a few other jobs, but has been trucking for 13 years.

While trucking is a job, it’s a lifestyle that harkens back to the days of John Wayne.

“It kind of put you in the mindset that (truckers) are almost the last view of cowboys,” he said.

“You’re king of your own boss, make own rules, no one’s looking over your shoulder.”

That is, as long as the cargo is delivered safely and efficiently, Johnson added.

“It’s a great passion of mine, just like riding horses and being home with my family,” Johnson said.

But the show will prove, Johnson said, that trucking is a lifestyle suited for tough guys and girls.

Johnson admitted some situations audiences will see on the show that might cause his mother Joyce Johnson in Detroit and his aunt Sadie Mickell in Morgantown to wince.

For example, the most recent episode showed Johnson dangling out an opened passenger door of a big rig to check on his cargo as he and his partner, Stuart from Essex, England, barreled through the desert with another pair of contestants on their fenders.

Johnson said some situations might also make audiences laugh, especially those he suspected producers finagled to force him to squeeze his giant frame in the smallest cabins possible.

Though he said he took some risks he might not have taken on the job in the States, Johnson said he was determined to get the job done.

“I’m very competitive in everything I do,” he said.

Though he might change a few things if he ran the show, Johnson said, the experience was wonderful and hopefully one that will open door doors.

“It was a blast.”

“Not to mention I get a chance to represent and illustrate my home state of Mississippi, which I am a huge fan of,” he said.

And Johnson’s confidant the portrait of a Mississippi trucker is one that will come off plenty tough enough to viewers.