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A Minnesota man has grown the world's largest pumpkin... again

SACHA PFEIFFER, HOST:

And now an update to a story we brought you last year. It was a year ago this week that we introduced listeners to a champion farmer.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)

TRAVIS GIENGER: My name is Travis Gienger. I am a horticulture teacher and I also grow giant pumpkins.

PFEIFFER: Last October, Gienger, who's from Anoka, Minn., set the record for the largest pumpkin ever grown in North America.

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

Well, yesterday it happened again. You go, Travis. He beat his own record.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Two, seven, four, nine.

(CHEERING)

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Half Moon Bay is in the record books. That's a world record. World record.

(CHEERING)

KELLY: That's right, 2,749 pounds - almost 200 pounds heavier than last year's fruit.

PFEIFFER: Gienger took the top prize at the 50th annual World Championship Pumpkin Weigh-Off in Half Moon Bay, Calif., with a piece of produce he affectionately named Michael Jordan.

KELLY: The man came to win, Sacha.

PFEIFFER: (Laughter).

KELLY: As our colleagues at Minnesota Public Radio put it in their coverage, sometimes you got a gourd big or gourd home.

(SOUNDBITE OF THE SMASHING PUMPKINS SONG, "TODAY") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.