Gianna Loraditch had an advantage going into the Iowa State Fair’s annual pie-eating contest.
The 6-year-old is missing her two front teeth.
No pesky enamel to block her slice. Wide open for hoovering crust straight into her mouth.
She tied for a Blue Ribbon in her age category with her cousin, Tage Larsen. “I. Love. PIE!” she screamed, beaming through a chocolate mustache.
Turns out she’s a legacy, of sorts. Her dad, Tim, 45, has won two Blue Ribbons, back to back. He was here to defend his title.
“I almost didn’t do it, but my kids shamed me,” he says. “They said, ‘If you don’t participate, that’s basically giving up,’ and I always tell them not to give up.”
Three other members of this Colfax tribe also put their face to the test: Titus, 9, and Justice, 14.
“My 14-year-old’s got a big mouth, and he’s always running it, so I think he’ll be fine,” says Tim, with a laugh.
And Felicity, 16, who took off her glasses like a swimmer adjusting goggles and turned her plate just so, lining up the crust to be closest to her mouth. Her plan was to take the thickest portion down first, a trick she learned from her dad.
From itty bitties to gray hairs, men and women, country people and city folk, eaters who drew a circle around this date as soon as the fair schedule was released to those who just stumbled upon the hoopla, the fair’s pie-eating contest is open to all. And this year it drew more than a hundred entrants for a chance at a ribbon. And honor.
And — at the very least — a slice of French Silk.
The pie-eating contest — which is sponsored by the Iowa Parks and Recreation Association — is one of the most entered competitions at the fair. And faces have been getting covered in pie bits for more than 30 years at the Iowa State Fair, a fact that was memorialized a few years ago with a giant sand sculpture of pigs participating in their own pie-eating contest.
For some, it’s a tradition. For others, it’s just plain weird and wacky enough to push them out of their comfort zone, making them not a just spectator to the Iowa State Fair, but an actual participant. And giving them the unique opportunity to be woven into the threads of the fair, to really experience it.
“I love parks and rec day because you just show up, you don’t have to be in 4-H or be an artist or anything like that. You can just come and eat free pie and go home with a ribbon,” says Dustin Belknap, who won the 30-39 age division handily.
The final whistle came less than 10 seconds into their heat — literally — stunning other competitors.
He’d won as a child, too, he says. Dynasty.
The pie-eating contest — along with the bubble gum blowing contest and the Big Wheel races, which are also sponsored by the association — fall in line with the goal of many of Iowa’s local parks departments: to provide communities with opportunities that are fun and affordable.
“You don’t have to sign up months or weeks in advance. We don’t fill up. It’s come as you are, and then hopefully we will get you up on stage and participating,” says Austin Tasler, chair of the association’s State Fair committee.
It’s silly, he adds, and you will get chocolate on your face.
Contestants must put their hands behind their back in this contest, so there’s only really one technique to winning: the smash-your-face-into-the-plate-and-hope-for-the-best method.
Phyliss Fairchild, 55, who’d already gone in her age division, re-entered the open class with her brother, Dan Pilkington, 67. Just as the start was called, she pushed his face into the plate — sisters, ya know?
“She wanted to throw me off,” he says. “But she helped.”
He won the Blue Ribbon.
On the sidelines, Fairchild’s daughter, Kassi Taft, tried to help her mother get back on track: “Mom, you’re laughing too much.”
Taft’s kids took home some ribbons in egg rolling earlier in the fair, and they were headed to Big Wheel racing right after pie-eating.
“Getting involved, that’s the true fair, I say,” she says. “You can’t experience the fair, really, if you don’t try for a ribbon in something. Anything.”
When approaching the competition table, some eaters stretched. Others pulled their hair back.
And Tom Simmons, a decades-long pie-eating judge, was there to tell contestants to take the sunglasses off their head. He’s seen too many people thrown off rhythm by glasses unexpectedly dropping in pie.
After “Go” is called, Simmons, a retired recreation director from Clarion, yells at competitors: CHEW AND SWALLOW.
A rallying cry, he says. Though INHALE is probably more correct form than CHEW.
“People come and they say, ‘Oh, I was here last year. I got second.’ Or: ‘I got first.’ Or: ‘I didn’t place.’ But they keep coming back,” he says.
“Everybody’s a winner, you know. It’s all about enjoying life.”
If you think pie-eating is a young man’s game, you haven’t seen the over-60 division at the Iowa State Fair.
Dave Horman, 69, who has been trying for a decade to get a Blue Ribbon, finally took the big title this year. A big moment in an already big year: he and wife, Rose, just celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary.
“We have so much fun here,” he says. “It is just our thing now, and everybody comes to cheer us on.”
Like his daughter in the earlier heat, Tim Loraditch tenderly turned his plate until the crust faced him and dove in.
“I tried to squish as much into the plate as possible, but someone else did that better than I did today,” he says. “That’s alright, a lot of good competitors out here.”
The agony and the ecstasy of pie-eating on display.
“To me, this is a big part of just being an Iowan, coming out, enjoying the weather, enjoying the people and just celebrating all the good, you know?” Loraditch adds.
Last year, Zack Lucas stole hearts in his post-contest interview after winning a Blue Ribbon. He wasn’t going to come again this year, but his great-grandma, Margo Oakes, decided to bring him at the last second: “Why not give it a shot?”
“Last year, we were inundated with calls and people and emails and voicemails, just hundreds of them, I swear,” says Oakes. Even today, people on the concourse recognized Zack from last year.
Zack took third this year, which is still meaningful, Oakes says.
“I’m so proud of him, just that he got up in front of people, because he doesn’t usually do that. So I’m just real proud of him,” she says.
And to celebrate, Zack says he wants ice cream — which is the perfect partner to pie.
Courtney Crowder, the Register’s Iowa Columnist, traverses the state’s 99 counties telling Iowans’ stories. She’ll be at the State Fair everyday. Say hi and pass along ideas! Reach her at ccrowder@dmreg.com or 515-284-8360.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: You will get chocolate on your face, and other dispatches from Iowa State Fair pie-eating
Reporting by Courtney Crowder, Des Moines Register / Des Moines Register
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
