Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
A team of four Warsaw Community High School football players found the quickest way to eat 40 pancakes during the first annual Kiwanis Club of Warsaw Pancake-Eating Contest.
“Just eat them as fast as possible and drink lots of water. Fold them up in like burritos,” said sophomore player Brady Sauer, who was on the winning team. “It started to get difficult toward the end. I felt like I was about to puke.”
The competition, involving two four-player teams from WCHS and two four-player teams from Tippecanoe Valley High School, took place Saturday morning at the Zimmer Biomet Center Lake Pavilion during the Kiwanis’ pancake and egg all-you-can-eat breakfast.
Joni Truex, a 25-year member of Kiwanis, said they have the breakfast annually.
“We raise money. Historically, we have given the money - half and half - to Riley’s Children’s Hospital and the K.C. Riley Kids Fund, which stays local. This year, we have decided to add Joe’s Kids, so we’ll be doing a threeway split on all of the proceeds. We’re hoping to raise at least $6,000 to be able to give each of them $2,000,” she explained.
The cost of the breakfast was a free-will donation, which Kiwanis switched to last year. Truex said they found “a lot of people are more than willing to be generous and give us a lot more than the ticket price used to be. So we’re very happy about that.”
Breakfast included pancakes, scrambled eggs or eggs with ham and cheese, fruit toppings, with butter and real maple syrup, milk, chocolate milk and orange juice.
For the pancake-eating contest between Valley and Warsaw football players, Truex explained there were two teams of four from each school for a total of eight players from each school.
“Plus, we’ll have a coach and an assistant coach representing the teams. They will not be participating this year, but the Warsaw football coach - Bart Curtis - has thrown down the hatchet that they should have a coach pancake-eating contest next year,” Truex stated. “So that would be fun next year to have the coaching staff do that. So, we’ll see if we can work out those details next year.”
Each team of four on Saturday got 40 pancakes. They could split them up amongst themselves however they wanted. When a team consumed all 40 of their pancakes, they raised their hands to indicate they were done. All participants received medals as a thank-you from the Kiwanis. Second place - which also was a Warsaw team - received Amazon gift cards; with first place also receiving Amazon gift cards, but for a bit more money.
The first place team included Sauer, Rock Lambert, Jacob Stofer and Ethan Rivich. Second place was Max Martinez, Maclain Williams, Christopher “Van” Crisp and Nealy Wallace.
Participants from Valley included, team one, Michael Samuels, Zander Ioannou, Braylon Fannin and Mason Miller; and, team two, Anakin Burke, Teagan Powell, Charlie Moriarty and Xander Dausman.
Before the contest, Tippecanoe Valley Head Football Coach Steve Moriarty said along with the eight players competing, a number of other players came to support their teammates.
“The majority of the team is here today just to support the other eight that are competing,” he said.
“Anytime we can support a good cause like Kiwanis - they do a great thing for the community - and anytime we can support that and add to that, we try to as much as we can. So that’s why we agreed to do this and to compete with Warsaw and Coach Curtis, it does nothing but boost our community and teaches the kids how to give back,” Moriarty said.
His advice to the players on how to eat the pancakes was simple: Fast.
Curtis said immediately after Kiwanis member Jeremy Walters emailed him about the contest, he threw it out to the kids and in five minutes they had two teams of four.
He agreed it was for a good cause, but didn’t give them any advice on how to eat the pancakes.
“I haven’t, but they seem to have their own strategy,” Curtis said. “I talked to a couple of the Valley kids. They’re going to fold them up, eat them dry.”
Curtis quickly asked his players about their strategy and the response he got back was that they were going to “squish them and eat them.”
Truex explained that Kiwanis is a global organization of volunteers. Everything they do is volunteer.
“We serve our local community and the children of the world, and we believe that one can make a difference. We do what we can to help people and to help our communities, and that includes everything from fundraising to donate the money to places that really help kids ... We do Mobile Meals. We do rose sales to use money for grants. We give out grants all year. You have to apply for the grant, but it’s a pretty simple process and once we give that grant, then it’s for things that meet our vision and our mission,” Truex said.
Kiwanis Club of Warsaw has existed since April 4, 1921. They meet at Papa Vino’s every Thursday from 11:45 a.m. to 1 p.m. Any guests or first-timers are free, Truex said.
“Come check us out and see if you want to be a part of our organization. We love new members,” she said.
