The Adribbers started as a team of advertising agency people some 27 years ago when the Cooking Contest was only three years old. Now it’s got a tentful of trophies and cook Bill Carrier tells us why it’s so scrumptious in this video. Warning: This will make you hungry.

–Jon W. Sparks

So I’m down talking to the folks at Got Pig?, who advanced to the big league this year after a good run in Patio Porkers (when you win in Patio, you move up). For the past four years, they barbecued next to a team called Shipwracked from South Carolina and it was all a big party. This year some of the guys, including Hal Rhodes and Bernie Bastian, from South Carolina joined their team and they’re competing together. I tasted their beef brisket, barbecued chicken and dynamite  grouper and came away impressed. But this surprised me: When Rhodes and Bastian compete in Memphis, they change their sauce.

“They have to sweeten it up a little when they compete here,” team member Brian Janz said.

I always go for hot sauces, and though I know there’s sugar in barbecue sauce, the ones I use or make aren’t generally sweet, so I told Rhodes I was the exception when he mentioned that women tend to prefer sweeter sauces. However, you can’t argue with success.

“What we tasted in Patio Porkers was sweeter than we make, so that was when we started giving people what they wanted,”  Bastian said. “As soon as we started sweetening it up, we started placing.”

Got Pig? is a fun family team, mostly the Janzes and the Courts family. I wrote a story about them last year–they’re the ones who do Jaeger Bombs and even convinced me, with even the little kids cheering me on, to try one. It’s Jaegermeister and Red Bull, and while one was plenty for me, these things are popular.

“We have an infinite supply,” Tim Courts said. “We will never run out.” Competing teams come over and put in their orders. “If they ask for 20, they leave with 20,” he added. –Jennifer Biggs

The Danish National Barbecue Team made its first appearance at the WCBCC this year. Their coach: Craig Whitson from the Norwegian team which is making its third showing. Here’s a video of the Danish team on its first foray.

–Jon W. Sparks

Here’s a random array of barbecue contest images and noise, from signage to Ms. Piggie Idol contest foolishness.

–Jon W. Sparks

The Other White Meat Tour has a big presence at the barbecue contest, doing some demos, giving away samples and looking for the No. 1 Pork Fan in Memphis.

Yes, it’s one big promotional hullabaloo for the National Pork Board, but there is one nice benefit: for every entry in the No. 1 Pork Fan contest, the organization will donate 10 pounds of pork to the Mid-South Food Bank.

If you want to enter, go by The Other White Meat Tour exhibit from 3-5 p.m. today or tomorrow and sign up. You’ll get to take the stage and dance or sing or declaim or whatever about the wonderfulness that is pork.

The winner will be announced at 6 p.m. Saturday and gets a $500 Sam’s Club gift card and a chance to win a trip to New York City and meet Guy Fieri.

–Jon W. Sparks

Last year the Ques Brothers surprised folks by taking home a third place trophy in the shoulder category in just their second year in competition. This year, the size of their team has more than doubled to 76 members.

“Last year everyone on other teams were coming over to our booth and they had so much fun they joined,” said Mike “Mikey” King.

They’ve created a booth that looks like Chile, from Eastern Island moai (don’t call them Tiki heads!) in the front to a beach in the back. They’ve got a movie screen set up and the folks from the Center from Southern Folklore will be showing live concert videos of Memphis musicians tonight (and other videos throughout the festival).

This is one of the teams I’ll be following over the next couple of days. They placed 12th the first year and then took the third place trophy last year, so they’s planning on a big win this year.

“If you just keep following the line, we’re going to take all of it this year,” said team member Christopher Blank. –Jennifer Biggs

Reprinted here for your reading pleasure (and containing a few words to the wise) is the Memphis in May rules and regs for people negotiating the WCBCC. You have been warned.

Before you visit the World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest, there are some things you will need to know. We’ve tried to sum them up for you in the following:

1. This is a competition. Local health regulations prohibit teams from serving barbecue to the general public. There are barbecue vendors, as well as other food vendors that can sell to the public.
2. There are two programs for our patrons that allow them to experience the World Championship as a team or judge would: People’s Choice Contest allows John “Que” Public to taste and judge championship barbecue. In this tent, you will receive 5 samples of barbecue each visit and you judge your favorite of those five samples. You may judge as often as you like and the judging fee is $4 per visit. The Cooker’s Caravan takes you on a guided tour of the teams and lets you hear first-hand about the team’s passion for pork. The team’s will tell you about their secrets for grilling championship barbecue, show you their rigs and explain the process of cooking at Memphis in May. There is no charge for the tours and you may tour as often as you like. The tours are available Thursday and Friday every thirty minutes from 11:30am - 3:30pm.
3. The park is about a mile from end to end. Wear comfortable shoes!
4. No beverages, bicycles, cans, containers, coolers, food, glass bottles, laser pointers, lawn chairs, oversized umbrellas, pets, roller blades, roller skates, water guns, no thrown objects such as baseballs, footballs, frisbees-etc., or weapons. Food and beverages, including beer, are available from the concessionaires.
5. All packages and purses are subject to inspection.
6. Picture I.D.’s will be required from everyone purchasing alcohol.
7. All food must be purchased with cash. ATM’s are available within the Festival site for your convenience.
8. We welcome many out-of-town visitors. Please let our guest services volunteers know you are our visitor and they will explain all of the rib-tickling entertainment offered.

–Jon W. Sparks

John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers closed the Blues Tent and did so with tributes to Sonny Boy Williamson and Albert King, among others. Here’s a video of Mayall and some couldn’t-be-restrained boogiers.  I got more than a few inquiries from people who had no idea who he was. Why they thought I’d know anything, I’ll never know. Did I have an expression of great knowledge? Or just the hair as gray as Mayall’s.

–Jon W. Sparks

This photo was taken toward the end of the day on Sunday at the Beale Street Music Festival.  A young Chilean singer tried to impress the crowd by riding his horse through Tom Lee Park and onto the Sam’s Town stage. The mud was so deep that the horse got stuck and the more it struggled to get out, the deeper it sunk until, tragically, the beautiful steed vanished beneath the surface. One witness said: “I can relate: I lost a flip-flop in that puddle.”

In all my years covering the music festival, I have never seen the mud so deep, even on the rainier weekends. One of the reasons, I think, is because the rainfall never let up. Typically, festival operators will send in big vacuum trucks in the middle of the night that suck the excess water from the surface after a downpour. Then they fill in the pits with dirt and drop extra plywood down in the slippery areas.

None of that happened after Saturday’s concert because it rained hard all night. Executive vice president Diane Hampton hoped it would let up by 11 a.m. But it didn’t. Then it rained all day, constantly, and by Sunday evening, the entire landscape looked like this:

Basically, a vast field of mud. I wear a big pair of army combat boots which have generally kept my feetsies dry, like they did back when I was in ‘Nam (not really). They did not work this time around. My feet are cold and wet.

Remember the good old days when a storm would come, make a mud puddle, and crazy kids would go sliding around in the puddles and become Mud People? That didn’t happen this year that I saw. Everyone saw the mud and recoiled. They tried to stay on the concrete paths, until the concrete paths turned into rivers of mud.

Most people just wanted to stay on top of it, rather than sink down into it. These women (pictured above) are wearing inflatable ponchos which allowed them to sail across the surface of the muck, using their feet as paddles. They were moving fast, too, so I was unable to get their names or the place you can buy a poncho like this.

It’s two weeks until barbecue fest, so we hope the vacuum trucks stick around a while. There’s a lot of muck to suck. And if anyone can help a poor Chilean boy get a ride back to Santiago, please contact Memphis in May headquarters. Thank you.

–Christopher Blank

It’s the Sam’s Town stage a couple of minutes ago. Glad not to be on the cleanup committee.