Behold, the pumpkin king: A 2,346 pound gourd
After narrowly missing the title last year, electric vehicle engineer Brandon Dawson took home the top prize at the Safeway World Championship Pumpkin Weigh-Off in Half Moon Bay, California. His enormous canteen weighed 2,346 pounds. That’s about the weight of a bison or a small sedan!
The annual pumpkin weighing contest has been compared to the Super Bowl of pumpkin growing. Over the past few years, the event has seen numerous historic gourds breaking all records. In 2023, horticulture professor Travis Gienger, a four-time weigh-in winner, broke the Guinness Book of World Records at the event with his 2,749-pound pumpkin. It is therefore safe to say that this year’s competition was tough.
Dawson started growing huge pumpkins five years ago as a hobby. A longtime gardener, Dawson works full-time as a manufacturing engineer at Rivian Automotive in Sonoma County, California. That mechanical experience influenced his pumpkin-growing technique, he said. “Sometimes he [growing pumpkins] gets pretty technical with a lot of detail on how you water and how you fertilize,” Dawson told the Associated Press.
Dawson also loved involving her young children in the process. “It’s really a family affair,” he laughs.
“We love spending time in the field and watching the thing grow,” Dawson said, referring to her 4-year-old daughter and 2-year-old son. “My 4-year-old daughter can now really pay attention to the growing process,” especially since the pumpkin is starting to weigh 50 to 70 pounds a day, easily more than its body weight.
In 2024, Dawson came in second at the weigh-in, losing just six pounds to Gienger, the reigning champion. But this year, Gienger’s pumpkin was damaged during the growing season, putting him out of contention for the 2025 title.
After Dawson was announced Monday as the winner of the 52nd Safeway World Pumpkin Weighing Championship, he sat his two young children atop the enormous pumpkin for a photo opportunity. It’s safe to say there were smiles and cheers all around, as the new pumpkin weigh-off winner posed with his family.
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