1st comp coming up, feeling the pressure

When and where?

Have a clock on the wall and your timeline written down and keep to it.
And for Christs sake, have fun!

Sorry...missed the end of March in Vegas post - good luck! And have fun!

My first contest ever was last year and you have some excellent advice here so far. I will add what I think ended up being most important to me.

Prep your chicken the night before (read the rules to know what not to do)

Don't let other cooks influence what you are doing. Have confidence in what you are doing and realize you are fully capable of turning in a fine product. I was watching and talking with the guy next to me and his big cuts were 30-40 degrees ahead of mine by 2 am. I thought I was doing something wrong and started to second guess my timelines. In the end his food was aweful and I was dead on where I wanted to be.

Practice making your turn in boxes........trust me it takes more effort then you think and sloppy scores on appearance will kill you.

I was nervous, and I felt intimidated like everyone knew all these secrets I could only hope to not come in last against. I looked at the list of team names and there were no less than four BBQ Pitmasters competitors and many other teams of local "fame".

We had a GREAT time........every person we met was friendly and we laughed so much all night it was like a huge party. Suddenly everyone got serious and the chit chat stopped.......it was Gametime. We focused on what we knew and what we do best and my wife and I finished 11th out of 42 teams and we took two trophies and a check home for 6th in ribs and 3rd in pork. When it was all said and done the Pitmasters teams were looking up at us.

I won't lie..........it was fun as hell to hear our names called at the awards ceremony. It's addictive and it's also funny how your mindset can quickly shift to actually believing you can win one of these things......LOL

I'm sure I have humbling experiences in my future too numerous to count but don't be afraid to be proud of your talents. You may just be surprised at how well you do!!!!


Funniest of all is I was SURE if we got lucky enough to get a call it would be in chicken ........thought we nailed it spot on. Still don't know what we did wrong but it was our worst score of the contest LOL!!!!


Good luck!

Now I have not yet done a competition, but I read the following on here.

Do a practice run that will simulate the competition. Before you do that put out everything you think you will need to take with you in a staging area. Make a list of everything in the staging area. Check the items off the list as you use them. If you have to go get something that wasn't in the staging area add it to the list. Anything you don't end up using you probably don't need. The items checked off on the list will make up our packing list for the competition.

When I read this it made total sense to me and I will follow this advice when I manage to compete for the first time.

Good luck and let us know how things are going periodically.

Brian

definitely pre-trim if possible.

You can pre-trim all your meats...just can't season or inject them. You can even pre-make your boxes then transfer them to your comp boxes. Have your gameplan handy and an accurate clock that you verify with the judges official one. Know your pit and how it cooks in different weather situations. Have an idea how you want to arrange the mets in your turn in boxes and ONLY put in the best meat...do not worry if your money muscle is mush...go with chunks and pulled. If your flat is poppin' and your cubed point is not...go with the slices. Be DAMN sure your chicken is cooked...and above all...RELAX...it ain't rocket science...

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Don't change your meats. I did my first competition last year and went with a different source for brisket. The meat turned out tough and cost me points so stay with a source your happy with if the meats bad to start it will cost more in the end. good luck and enjoy your self.:becky:

jketron said:

I'm looking over my equipment and my Ford Explorer... Anyone got a shoe-horn?

This may be an excuse to by a new truck

Click to expand...

Ohhhh, you will buy a new truck, and then a better smoker because the truck can pull it, then you will want an enclosed trailer, now that old new truck is just a touch too small for your new fancy trailer... So you buy another new truck. The circle of competition barbecue life!

I love my enclosed trailer. Its also Multi purposed. Deff nice to be able to get out of the elements for prep and all