Page 19 - August 2021 Barbecue News Magazine

judged the World Food Champi- onship in Celebration, Florida. I judged that event as well, but had not met the Dimaggio’s at that time. In 2006 Gayle met a Florida Bar- beque Association (FBA) judge and learned about that organization. As time passed and contests evolved, the Dimaggio’s found themselves doing more FBA events simply be- cause there were more events to judge without driving out of state.
Rick worked with a travel agency and helped set up bus tours. He also worked other supplemental jobs. At one point he was driving brand new Audi and VW automobiles for quality control. Gayle was in the food industry and worked primarily with private label products. She was in- volved with measuring the impact women had with store brands. She said. “Basically I was getting women more in- volved in the people business.” By their own admissions, Gayle is the “big picture” person and Rick is the detail per- son.
When I first moved to Florida, I was a long time KCBS Mas- ter Judge and Certified Table Captain with over 100 con- tests judged. I had met Marty Hyde, who was a high profile judge in both KCBS and FBA. He took me under his wing and introduced me to the FBA. FBA did not recognize any of my KCBS experience levels, so started over from scratch. Their annual Fun Cook was coming up in Clermont and Marty was teaching the new judge training class. I signed up. The best of plans can change, and Marty was not able to teach this class. He tapped Rick Dimaggio to teach the class and that is where I first met Rick. He taught the judges class as a team with his wife Gayle. She would sit with the new judge candidates and answer their questions and pro- vide guidance. She sat at my table for the training, that is where we first met as well. It was a fun evening, and I be- came a certified FBA judge at the end of the day. That started my FBA experience.
This is a good example of how this team gives back to com- petition BBQ. Rick shows up and does what is necessary to make the contest happen. He has a long history of judging. He has worked the turn in tables at numerous events as well as the grazing table. He has supplemented organizers that needed help pulling an event together and even been a Rep when they were shorthanded. He has been involved with site inspections where plans was being made for locat- ing new FBA contests. He has done just about every job there is to be done at any BBQ competition, and he does them all very well. More recently he has trained others to teach the judge class, so now he is training the teachers. He also recruits new members for FBA.
Recently they were both recognized by the FBA for judging over 200 contests. They have this very coveted name badge
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that only a few members of the FBA judging community have. Gordon Phillips was profiled last year in this column, and he is another FBA judges that wears that 200 contest badge. Gordon personally congratu- lated Rick for his accomplishment. (see photo) More recently at the KCBS Festival of Discovery they were both recognized by lead Rep, Rusty Cook, for reaching the 30 con- test level with KCBS contests. (see
photo) This achievement fulfills the requirement for the Master Judge credentials in KCBS.
Gayle made a remarkably interesting evaluation during our interview. She feels that competition BBQ is shifting from an emphasis on food to an emphasis on people. This ap- plies not only to cook teams but also to judges, reps, organ- izers, and just about everyone involved with BBQ. Everything has a shelf life, and we have all seen some very high-quality people step aside from their BBQ duties for various reasons. I have personally appreciated knowing and observing the Dimaggios many contributions to competi- tion BBQ and hope their shelf life is still a long way away. We need them to keep our standards and quality high. I am looking forward to them also getting more involved with KCBS.
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