Shiggin & Grinnin named Grand Champion at American Royal Barbecue Open

• American Royal
• Shiggin & Grinnin took home the big check Sunday.

Today marks the first day since Thursday that I haven’t eaten barbecue. But it’s early, so I’ll report back in a few hours. The 33rd Annual American Royal World Series of Barbecue Open contest concluded Sunday with Minnesota’s Shiggin & Grinnin (Derek Schansberg, Jeff Vanderlinde and Ted Moonen) besting a record field of 544 other teams to take home the title of Grand Champion and the $12,500 check. A day earlier, it was Sterling Ball and Big Poppa Smokers (based out of San Luis Obispo, California) celebrating their win in the Oklahoma Joe’s Invitational Contest. [The full results are available here.]

In this week’s Pitch, we’ll have a photo round-up of the weekend, while the following week, I’ll detail what it was like to spend the past 96 hours as a barbecue judge. Safe to say, it was meat-intensive.