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#20 American Royal Open, Kansas City, Missouri - October 2005
20th place overall / 474 teams -- woohooo!!!
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Chicken
94th
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Ribs
181st
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Pork
37th
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Brisket
21st
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"Okay. Chin up!! So you were a dismal 69th in the Invite." Last year we tanked the invitational, and rebounded in the Open. So we put our hopes on a rebound, and cooked the same stuff we cooked the day before (and all year long). Dizzy Pig and Big Green Eggs!! Well, this time the judges agreed about how consistently good our food has been! To receive three top 100 finishes of nearly 500 teams, and a 20th overall is very cool.
Not only did we have a nice showing, but we got to spend some time over on The Dark Side! This is the party spot, where hundreds of teams both cook and throw huge parties. It is quite a scene. Got to hang out with some really good folks both days at "The Royal", and we enjoyed this even more than last year. Even though it's over a thousand miles, we'll be back if we are lucky enough to be invited again!
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#19 American Royal Invitational, Kansas City, Missouri - October 2005
69th place overall / 81 championship teams
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Chicken
77th
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Ribs
77th
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Pork
15th
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Brisket
20th
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Receiving an invitation to the American Royal for a second year straight is an honor. All of the team was excited to make the trip out to KC dragging a bunch of Big Green Eggs. To compete alongside more than 80 grand championship teams is a memorable (and humbling) experience. It is also a whole bunch of work and a really, really long drive. But the team works so well together, things went very smooth. What a great time we all had. This time we knew even more of the other teams, so it was more like a gathering with good friends and less stressful than last year. We had two goals when we left. Improve over our 62nd place overall finish last year, and get a call to the stage.
Well, we met one goal with a strong 15th place finish in pork (and call to the stage for a ribbon). Unfortunately our ribs and chicken did not fare as well with the judges, and we sadly ended up in 69th place!
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American Royal Barbecue, Invitational and Open, Kansas City
The Royal. It is kinda hard to put in words. So here are some pictures!
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| 1100 miles to drive, so we got on the road Tuesday evening. Chasing the sunset we stopped for gas and I got this shot of John. |
Still on the road with the sun coming up behind us, the Dizzy Pig team makes their way across Indiana. |
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| Dang. Look! We are now in the "West". |
20 or so hours on the road, and we dropped off the trailer in front of the Kemper Arena. Here we are at the Royal. |
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| Not much in the way of teams set up on the Dark Side on Thursday. The scenery sure changed the following night! |
The truck drives real easy without a trailer behind it. Here it is after we pulled up to Rodney's Inn for a good night's rest. |
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| Thursday mornin it's time to start thinking about setting up our site and getting some meat cookin! The KC skyline looms. |
We drove over 1,000 mles from our city of Washington DC, over miles and miles of farmland, to yet another city!! |
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| Just about to the Kemper again. |
Time to set up. First comes Dad's famous good luck rocking chair |
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| Old Dave and John waste no time getting going on the drinking. |
Chuck and John sucking in the experience and relaxing after some hard work setting up. |
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| Dr BBQ, and the Bonesmokers team cooked across the way. Always good neighbors. |
Kenny and Chuck help John prep fpr his special "garlic chicken stew" |
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| Sheri of the Pellet Envy team gets set to enjoy one of Rod's Monster Burgers. |
John gets to work on trimming the brisket. |
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| Something about the early morning light on glistening pork butts! |
The team worked together like a machine. Everybody knew what was going on. |
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| We had a good sized space with plenty of room to spread out. |
Rick Salmon and John share some good times. |
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| Judging tables for the Open. |
Kenny has his game face on while he glazes the ribs with our special sauce. |
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| Chuck and Chris remove chicken from a hot egg. |
Jim Minion and Ray Lampe hangin loose. |
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| Going to the awards. |
The Invitational awards. |
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| Making it up to the stage at the Royal Invitational!!!! Shweeeet. |
After the awards we walked over to the darkside. This is where some major partying is going on. |
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| More partying under the highway. |
Speaking of parties, some friends on a team called Extreme Pork had a pretty big party including a live band and some 300 people. This was one of hundreds of parties. |
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| A dozen or so hours of parties and the scene looks kind of like this. |
Rod and Kenny getting set to go back and start cooking for the open! |
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| Our next door neighbor, "Wonderful Walt" had a real nice group of people with him, and is quite a character himself. |
Woo, Woo, Peekabooo. |
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| Crunch time, but the team is relaxed and ready! |
Ribs lookin tasty. |
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| Woo Doggies. |
In classic form, why do you think they call him "The Senator"? |
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| Chris and John apply sauce carefully. |
After the final turn ins, we packed up most of the site and had a party under one canopy! |
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| The awards for the Open were alittle more elaborate. |
And the team barely able to stand after a long weekend. |
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| A wild view of the arch on the way home. |
The sunrise to the East, as Chris unknowingly drove North! |
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