2,175 Pound Giant Pumpkin

All they wanted was a world record, but this year’s champion of the Annual Safeway World Championship Pumpkin Weigh-off, Leonardo Urena of Napa, says he is thrilled to have simply grown a pumpkin over 2,000 pounds.

“That was my goal. This is my first pumpkin over 2,000 pounds, and I am so excited. I worked so hard,” shares Urena. “I’m so proud to win first place.”

His pumpkin weighed in at 2,175 pounds, which is 5 pounds more than 2018’s victor. The world record was set in 2016 at 2,624 pounds.

Urena’s is only the 2nd pumpkin grown in California this year to weigh over 2,000 pounds. He will get a check for $15,225, which he states will certainly be placed in the direction of his kids’s education fund.

A lot of the farmers say cooler temperatures this spring, made it hard to expand larger pumpkins.

“I’d love to!” says John Hawkley, also from Napa. “Back in 2014 we won here. We were the first pumpkin to break 2,000 pounds. And I have been trying ever since!”

Hawley positioned 4th. He claims obtaining pumpkins to become these enormous gourds has to do with discovering the appropriate seeds, dedicating months preparing the soil and feeding these monsters.

“I watered it twice a day, and then I feed it every three days through drip tubes,” explains Hawkley.

A few of these pumpkins can grow by 50 pounds a day.

For the group of a number of hundred individuals who came out, it’s everything about tipping the range, hoping a person breaks the globe record. But for a select few, they have a more customized taste.

“I like green ones,” says 8-year-old June Dalkert, not really interested in the size of the pumpkins.

Cindy Tobeck, who lives near Seattle, won this occasion in 2016. She states the huge pumpkins are a view to see, however includes a lot of hard work as well as an abundance of good luck.

“In the springtime it gets really cold, so I need to keep it in a warmer environment, but it can also be very windy in the spring time, so I really test my engineering and carpentering skills when the winds pick up and are beating down my greenhouses every spring,” explains Tobeck.

Urena’s pumpkin will belong to this weekend break’s Half Moon Bay Art and Pumpkin Festival.

Previously this year, Half Moon Bay’s Safeway World Championship Pumpkin Weigh-Off was called as the very first recipient of the Great Pumpkin Commonwealth’s (GPC) World’s Top Weigh-Off site award covering a 25 year period from 1993-2018.

“This inaugural honor was presented to the weigh-off site that has weighed the ten heaviest pumpkins in the history of the site being part of the GPC,” claimed GPC Historian Jack Larue. “In 2018, the GPC sanctioned 114 weigh-off sites worldwide,” stated Larue.

The leading ten pumpkins considered at the Half Moon Bay site have a complete consolidated weight of 20,414.0 pounds for a typical weight of 2,041.4 pounds. The Ohio Valley weigh-off site came in second location with a top 10 complete mixed weight of 20,282.0 pounds for an average weight of 2,028.2 pounds. In third place was the Stillwater Minnesota weigh-off site with a top ten total consolidated weight of 20,168.0 pounds for an average of 2,016.8 pounds.