The beautiful sky after the storms cleared out.
Pickin in the Panhandle 2012 brought 43 skilled competition teams into Hedgesville, WV, all hoping for a shot at the Jack Daniel’s invitational. The invite automatically comes with the grand champion trophy at this competition because it is the only KCBS sanctioned competition in WV. We knew, like always, that because of the chance to get to ‘The Jack” that there would be a good mix of skilled teams competing. Looking to the left of our camp we saw three teams: Pellet Envy, Cool Smoke, and Hambones by the Fire; maybe “skilled teams” was an understatement.
The BBQ was smelling so good Cosmo couldn't stop drooling.
The weekend started off very hot and humid. We were very happy to have our air-conditioned (and waterproof) RV. We arrived with our meat already trimmed, but we had two ancillary categories (anything meat and dessert) that we had not even practiced, so we spent Friday doing food prep and finalizing the recipes for the extra categories. Erin was prepared with some good ideas that were quickly revised into plans B and C. Saturday rolled around and everything was right on schedule. We knew that there was rain on the horizon and possibly even severe storms. As turn in time approached the rain closed in. We were able to walk chicken while it was still dry, but once the ribs came off, Erin checked the radar one more time and all I remember hearing was, “There is a red cell coming!” We looked at six beautiful racks of ribs that had just come off the smoker and knew outside was not the place to be. Within minutes we moved our operation inside. The rain started just after noon and I stepped outside to make sure everything was waterproof. I barely made it out the door and everything started shaking from the wind. I saw our 10’x10′ canopy raising off the ground and was able to grab hold of it, but the 50 mph force was enough to pull me off the ground with it. By the time I landed, two of the legs had folded and I wasn’t far from becoming a human kite. Erin came out to assist and during the downpour we were able to pull the walls down and lay the 10’x10′ on the ground. Ribs had to be cut in four minutes, so we headed back inside soaked to the bone. High winds and rain seem to be a common scenario that has played itself out at almost every competition this year, except this time we lost some equipment AND it happened right in the middle of turn in time.
The aftermath. If you look close there are broken canopy legs, a torn tarp, and everything is soaked.
Back inside we were able to towel off and focus on the ribs with only a few minutes until turn-in. Our ribs looked and tasted really good this week. I told Erin on Thursday, after I trimmed the ribs, that it was going to be a good rib week. After we built the turn in box, my feelings had not changed. Pork and brisket were both decent, but we weren’t sure if there was enough wow factor to win over a table of judges. After turning in our brisket we weren’t done yet. We still had to turn in our ancillary categories. Finally at 2:30 we were done with turn ins. Still soaking wet, we sat down in our wet chairs and had a beer. It had been a long day and dealing with cleaning up from the aftermath of the storm was not a motivating thought.
Our chili cups came in 3rd, but that didn't even earn us a ribbon!
After all that work we only heard our name once at the awards ceremony, it was for the ribs which we knew were top ten ribs. We ended up with 16th in chicken, 8th in ribs, 23rd in pork, and 22nd in brisket for a 15th place overall. We had mentioned to a newer team just the day before that with the level of competition that comes to Pickin in the Panhandle, anything in the top 15 is a good accomplishment. I think deep down we were hoping for a little better, mostly because we had such a strong finish the week prior at Tracy’s Landing. We certainly won’t hang our heads for finishing 15th overall; however, we will be putting pressure on ourselves to do better at our last two competitions this year. Congrats to Tuffy of Cool Smoke for a very strong Grand Champion finish. Tuffy is having the type of year that we all dream of in the competition world.
We learned this week that Smoketoberfest had been cancelled due to circumstances beyond the organizer’s control. We decided we would still like to compete a couple more times this season, so we have added Smokin’ on the Track in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley to our schedule. This is the first year for this competition, so we are excited to see how things will be set up at the speedway. After that we will finish the season at the Keystone Classic in Harrisburg, PA. Hard to believe the 2012 season is almost behind us.
