Growers compete in World Championship Pumpkin Weigh-Off in Half Moon Bay

HALF MOON BAY, Calif. (KGO) — Growers from across the country have made their way to Half Moon Bay for a popular fall tradition, the Safeway World Championship Pumpkin Weigh-Off.

Travis Gienger, the world record holder, was fresh off a 32-hour drive from the Halloween capital of the world in Anoka, Minnesota.

“I mean well over 20 feet around, so if you think about that, that’s a pretty big pumpkin, it’s basically 7 foot by 6 and a half foot,” Gienger said.

Gienger is hoping to smash his own world record set last year, at 2,749 pounds.

LAST YEAR: Minnesota man breaks world record with 2,749-pound gourd, wins 3rd Half Moon Bay pumpkin weigh-off

“You’re almost like expected to do it and what people don’t realize is look, I didn’t even have the year to do this but I’m just happy being here and maybe we’ll get a top three finish or something,” he said.

But things haven’t been so easy for this three-time champion.

That’s why this year, he decided to name his giant pumpkin “Rudy” after Daniel “Rudy” Ruettiger, the college football underdog at the center of the movie “Rudy.”

“Right away, I was struggling, I couldn’t get one to set and I cracked a vine and I was like I don’t know if this is going to do it and then we had kind of a lot of storms so I named it Rudy and it just kind of caught on,” he said.

Brandon Dawson is here from Sonoma County.

His 117-day-old pumpkin was grown with the same seeds from Gienger’s world-record-setting pumpkin from last year.

“This giant pumpkin here is what we call a 2560 Gienger which means that the parent of this pumpkin was grown by Travis Gienger, the world record holder,” Dawson said.

MORE: Fall heat won’t keep families from popular Morgan Hill pumpkin patch

It’s only his fourth year growing and second time competing in Half Moon Bay, he’s hopeful he can walk away with a growers jacket.

“I mean it’s a lot of work, it’s a lot of luck, right, you’ve got to have good weather, you’ve got to have good luck,” Dawson said. “There’s a 1,000 square foot space that, just of plant, that feeds just this one pumpkin so imagine a thousand square feet of watering that you’re doing a couple times a day in some cases.”

And locals couldn’t seem to get enough of it.

“I’ve never seen them in person and one after another, there’s so many I can’t believe it,” Mimi Lyons, a Palo Alto resident said.

Lyons drove in from Palo Alto just for a glimpse of the giant gourds.

“I love pumpkins, and in fact, I fill my front yard with pumpkins because I love them so much, I make my own little pumpkin patch and so I literally drove over the hill and came here just to see what was happening and I just think it’s amazing!” Lyons said.

The winner will get a payout of $9 per pound.

And if they break the world record, their total winnings would be $30,000.