We're Backkkk.....

Back in 2009, we launched this blog to chronicle our initial journey the Jack Daniels World Championship Invitational Barbecue Competition - aka "The Jack.". Billed as the "World Championship of Barbecue", this epicurean "Superbowl" is held in the sleepy little hollow of Lynchburg, TN (pop.361) the 4th Saturday in October each year. It just so happens that Lynchburg is also home to the world renowned Jack Daniels distillery - the primary sponsor and namesake behind this culinary extravaganza.

Each year, tens of thousands of competition BBQ teams from across the United States (and around the world) spend countless hours and weekends competing in sanctioned BBQ events. These teams vie not only for Grand Championships & serious prize money (sometimes as much as $100K) - but perhaps even more importantly, they are all hoping by the end of the "BBQ season" to grab one of the 60 highly coveted spots to cook against an elite group of teams for the title of "world's best" (the "Jack" is by invitation only).

We competed in the 2009 Jack, and finished in the "middle of the pack" - an accomplishment we were certainly proud of. And after more or less taking the year off in 2010, "Hoochie-Que" is ramping up to make another run at a coveted invitation to the Jack in 2011.

So, after over a year of "neglect", we are "dusting off" this little ol' blog to once again share with family, friends, and other BBQ cooks/fans our experiences as we start our journey hopefully towards another invitation to the "Jack" in October 2011.

Also - and especially if you are new to this blog - make certain to read back through the "Blog Archive" to re-visit our experiences and trip to the Jack back in 2009! Some pretty good writing, memories & photos if I do say so myself!

Thanks - and we hope to see you in Lynchburg on October!

"Hoochie"
March 26, 2011

Sunday, November 01, 2009

The Jack - Part Two - The Teams


The 21st Annual Jack Daniel's World Championship Invitational Barbecue hosted 63 domestic Invitational teams and 18 International teams at this year's competition. The 63 domestic teams represented the "best of the best" out of a KCBS membership that totals nearly 10,000 worldwide and based on the results of over 300 KCBS sanctioned competitions held during the past year. The competition also included last year's grand champion at The Jack (4 Legs Up - KS) and the winners of the other "premier" barbecue events held each year across the US such as the Houston Livestock Show & Rodeo Barbecue, the Memphis is May Championship, and the open division of the American Royal Barbecue in Kansas City. The International teams that were invited this year represented the countries of Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Germany, Luxembourg, Poland, Puerto Rico, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.

As is often the case with competition barbecue events, the team names are generally quite witty and/or humorous, and the sites where the teams cook can be quite quite a "production" and colorful. The teams also arrive in everything from large million dollar Prevosts or Blue Bird RV's down to a simple flat bed trailer and pop-up canopies being hauled by an older pick-up truck.

Regardless of how we got there - or how "simple" or "fancy" our team sites were - the relationship among the cooks at this competition was "tight" and friendly. There was a deep and sincere mutual respect for the accomplishments that had brought all of us together - and while many of us arrived as "strangers" to each other, we all left as "good friends".

The Jack provided each team with a nice banner to display at each team's site. Below are photos of some of the teams that were close-by to where we cooked at the Jack this year.

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