As newcomers to the Barbecue Championship, most of the members on my team the Ques Brothers were elated when we heard that the judges had given us perfect tens in all the barbecue judging categories but one. He gave us a single nine for the look of our pork shoulder’s “bark.” He wanted a mahogany color. Ours was black.

Still, I thought that with 258 teams in the contest, a near perfect score must be big news.

Meanwhile, when our festival veteran Steve learned our scores, he said darkly: “That last judge just cut our throats.”

Team leader Chuck once said that getting into the top ten — out of around 60 pork shoulder teams — would fulfill his goal. He’d even be happy with top 20.

After the awards were given out Saturday night, we went back to our booth and waited for the list to be posted. Word spread quickly when it was, and a few of us went out to look for ourselves.

Outside the judging tent, a crowd had gathered.

Willie, our pitmaster, leaned in to have a look…

And we discovered we had come in 12th Place.

Now, this was far from tragic news. Some of these guys have been doing barbecue for years, and we had just started. Willie was more excited than I’d seen him all weekend.

He delivered a speech worthy of a major future contender.

“You know what this is? This is just like sailing,” he said. “Every year we do the Mackinaw Race, the longest freshwater race in the country. It’s 500 miles and takes about nine days. To do it, you’ve got to have everything ready. You’ve got to have everything in place before you even get on the boat because if something goes wrong when you’re out there, you’re stuck. So every year when I’m getting on my boat, I go through the whole process. Barbecue fest is just like that. There’s the preparation in advance, the checklists, and then the four days it’s like running a marathon. But now that we know what’s involved, and especially now that we know what the judges are looking for, next year is going to be that much better. I’m a yankee from Chicago and I come down here and get 12th place the first time ever entering a barbecue contest. There’s only one way to see that. It’s awsome.”

Later that night, we drained the last keg of Budweiser and ate the last of the pulled pork. No one was looking forward to Sunday.

Sunday: the day we had to take everything down. That’s the only disadvantage to having a monsterous party pavilion like ours. Steve has suggested we order one more keg to get us through the day…

That’s it for Barbecue Fest 2007. Look for the Ques Brothers next year… in the top three.