DETAILS FOR 2007 Chili Cook Off

The rain can't stop chili lovers from having some fun. On Saturday 4/22/2006 the 23rd annual Chili Cook Off saw over 12,000 chili and music fans gather at the Richmond Raceway Complex to sample the offerings of almost 30 professional and amateur division entrants.

For the music fans, it was an exciting day with the the bands Trapt, Shinedown, Hinder, Nonpoint, and Faktion playing to a crowd of 6,000 in the amphitheater. Event sponsor 102.1 "The X" put together a great lineup of hard rock bands that had the crowd on their feet for 5 hours.

This year's winner in the Professional category is Stool Pigeons. This was their first time in the competition, and they took home $1,000.00 and a nice trophy.

The Amateur division winner is Iron Kettle Chili, and they also received a trophy and $1,000.00 prize. Iron Kettle was headed by John Mallon, with his sons helping serve the chili.

John said "I have competed nationally, and won many such events."

A panel of judges from the Make-A-Wish Foundation decided the winners on this year's event. You can visit the Make-A-Wish Foundation web site by going to www.wish.org.

The winner of last year's event in the amateur division, Ron Romig of Key West Hurricane Chili, was out again this year with a new 90 gallon chili pot. As we go to press the results of this year's people's choice award are not yet available (visitors used text messaging to vote) but we would not be surprised to see Key West Chili win this award. They seemed to be a hands-down favorite with the crowd, and we also spotted members of the featured bands, along with members of Richmond-based superstars Lamb of God and Gwar, enjoying their chili.

The rain came to an end late in the afternoon, with most of the remaining crowd packing the amphitheater to see Trapt perform. We snapped some shots of the band, and other scenes from the cook off, which are all published below: