Nikolai Kurkov, a Muscovite, worked at a research institute and dreamed of defending his thesis on agrobiology, but when he arrived in one of the villages of the Non-Chernozem region, he met a childhood friend and stayed, heading a lagging collective farm...

Senior ship engineer Valentin Kravchuk brings his son to the Kuban to his aunt to go with his wife to rest in the south. In the evening, at the table, he argues with fellow villagers that he alone will be able to grind two hundred tons of bread. In excitement, he sacrifices the resort and remains at the harvesting shop to prove that he is a warrior in the field - even alone.