By JOHN EBY
Dowagiac Daily News

After winning 16 international cherry pit spit titles, Rick “Pellet Gun” Krause, 56, talks of retiring and giving other competitors a shot at his throne.

“This is my 16th one in 31 years,” Krause said Saturday. “I’m a little over .500, so I may be thinking about retiring soon. It’s getting too easy,” although this was his second-lowest winning distance after 2009, when he won with 48 feet, 1 1/2 inches.

Krause won the Pit Spit in 1980, 1983, 1984, 1985, 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1995, 1997, 1999, 2001, 2006, 2007 and 2009.

“A big part of it’s luck,” Krause said.

“I don’t know why I’m lucky at this instead of the lottery or the casino.”

Marlene “Machine Gun” Krause, 47, whom Rick married on this very court 14 years ago today, won her seventh women’s title, and son Brian, whose 32nd birthday is today, was runner-up with 40 feet, 2 1/2 inches.

“I had 50, but I stepped over the line on purpose,” Brian taunts his dad.

Brian set the world record, 93 feet, 6 1/2 inches, in 2003.

“Then I’ll spit the first one from my knees,” Pellet Gun fires back.

While Pellet Gun was heckled some for showboating Saturday when he won on his first try spitting on his knees, to Krause his winning flip of 51 feet, 3 inches, resulted from a strategic move to slip under the wind on a breezy afternoon.

“I’ve done this so many times I have a pretty good idea what the wind’s going to do,” Krause said. “If you’ve got any kind of headwind, it just knocks them down. You’d think if you just spit up into the air and let the wind blow it, but the wind knocks it down. It’s all about trajectory. I went to my knees because the wind was blowing pretty hard. I figured I’d get it down low, keep it low and try to skid one on the ground in a hurry. It worked. A little bit of it’s cocky. I knew if I didn’t win, my kid was going to win. We have a good rivalry between the two of us.”

“Our own World Cup” featured competitors from Israel, Spain, Guatemala, Italy, Canada, Australia, Massachusetts, Texas and Atlanta, which was a two-man crew producing a television show on festivals.

Signing an autograph for a Texas girl brings to Krause’s mind spitting watermelon seeds, among other things.

“It was last weekend,” the Sparta native informs her. “I went down there one time because they give out great prize money. If you broke the world record it was like $5,000.

“They have a narrow court on a road, about half as wide as” Tree-Mendus Fruit Farm, home of the 37th Annual International Cherry Pit Spit west of Indian Lake.

“They only give you two spits,” Krause said, “and it’s a lottery, so whoever wants to spit goes into a hat. They draw out 30 names and that’s the ones who spit. If you’ve got 500 people, you might not even get picked. They let me spit that one year and I think I had one of 67 that went out of bounds. The second one I tried to keep it in and didn’t do real good.”

“They’ve got all kinds of things you can do now,” Krause, of Tuba City, Ariz., said. “They’ve got frozen cricket spitting. They’ve got olive pit spitting which I almost went to this year out in California. For the cherry pit spit I’ve gone to California, Fish Creek, Wis., in the wintertime on the ice, Germany and Jay Leno’s show” on July 23, 1998.
After climbing off his motorcycle, Krause sprays the foliage behind the court with a fusillade of pits. What was that all about?

“It’s hard to get pits in Arizona,” he explains, giving a glimpse into his lack of training regimen, “so as soon as I get here I get a bunch” so he’s ready if someone requests an exhibition or a photo (showing off his Mr. Ptui tattoo). I just grind some with my tongue. A lot of people (overdo it). They come out here and spit 200 pits. The first 10 to 20 are their quality ones. After that it starts going downhill. That’s why they qualify in the morning spitting a long ways. Then they practice. I got here (Friday) and spit maybe a dozen and no more than 12 to 15 today. The main thing is to take your time and get the pit cleaned off really well. Then it’s just a matter of sealing the pit with your tongue. You can tell the people who have potential to be really good by the ‘pop.’ ”

Rick counts Tom Westgate of Berrien Center (28 feet, one inch) and Edwardsburg biology teacher Dave Bartz of Niles (39 feet) in that category.

Krause, of course, sounds like a hydraulic city bus door when he releases his Montmorency stone.

Brian “Young Gun” Krause, finished second with 40 feet, 2 1/2 inches, and Dowagiac Union High School guidance counselor Randy Luthringer of Niles (40 feet, one inch), a close third.

In an entrance recalling his showmanship of old (like a ring of fire across Eureka Road), “Pellet Gun” rode into the arena aboard a roaring motorcycle, stripped off his black leather riding togs and coonskin cap.

Two additional spits standing up short of the first mark on his knees.

Distances are measured to the spot the spat pit stops after rolling.

“I don’t think it’s my calling,” said Pastor Kevin Hester, who managed 35 feet, 6 inches.
In the women’s match, Marlene “Machine Gun” Krause, 47, out-spat Emily Johnson by 6 feet with a spit 34 feet, six inches, to take her seventh win.

Youth spitters flashed their propulsive techniques as Kevin Collins, Benton Harbor, finished first with a spit of 27 feet, eight inches, in the Youth 9-12 Division.

Grandson Cole Krause, Dimondale, took top honors with a 31 feet, 6 1/2 inch spit in the Youth 6-8 Division, and Zach Bartz, Niles, outdistanced his 5-Under competition with 16 feet, 6 inches.

In the Dignitaries Match, Walt Frank, manager of the Farm Bureau Oil Company near Eau Claire, outdistanced international competitors from Italy, Spain, Australia and Israel with a distance of 30 feet, 2 inches. Avie Brand of Israel took second place with a spit of 27 feet, 7 inches.

The 38th Annual International Cherry Pit Spitting Championship will be held July 2, 2011, at Tree-Mendus Fruit Farm, Eau Claire.

Tree-Mendus is a family-oriented, agri-tourism destination featuring you-pick fruit, family recreation and a country store (www.treemendus-fruit.com).

Founder Herb Teichman, a Dowagiac graduate, was absent while recovering from a hip replacement, so his daughter, Lynne Sage, and announcer Kay McAdam of Cassopolis, conducted the contest, which includes award presentations on a square of red carpet because “we spare no expense.”

McAdam, a former radio personality, led spectators in singing the song she wrote to the tune of “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.”