Headlamp, all charged up. Spatula. Baking sheet. Those in the throng arriving early to Sunday’s annual Puzzle and Pie Night clasped the items under their arms.
None of which I’d used, despite duly bringing them, last year, but still I arrived thus armed for the fifth annual Puzzle and Pie Night at the Carbondale Recreation and Community Center on Sunday, Feb. 22.
While we in our scant team of three were no contenders — I’d be content to finish the 500-piece jigsaw puzzle in the allotted time — another in my cohort concurred.
“I will still bring them,” Aisha Weinhold had texted, “because it makes us look like a threat.”
Each year, 50-some teams of up to four converge to tackle jigsaw puzzles made from a photo of Carbondale chosen in a contest, with pizza and soda water served. The fastest finishers earn a (shared) $120 gift certificate from the Carbondale Chamber, with $100 and $80 cards for second and third places. Entry is $50 per team, and free for the photo-contest winner.
“The winner always ends up participating,” said Brian Froelich, Aquatics and Health and Wellness Coordinator, adding that the others who submit images usually do, too. This year the chosen image, another by Tommy Sands, showed the Día de los Muertos Celebration, with Mount Sopris above in alpenglow.
According to Froelich, per estimates, the first year (2022) brought in 88 contestants; the number jumping to 200 the next year and holding at 280 in 2024 and 2025. This year brought roughly 250 people, he said.
Puzzle and Pie Night is the brainchild of Margaret Donnelly, formerly in Froelich’s job and a puzzler herself. Donnelly, now living in New Zealand, said via WhatsApp, “I was always looking for new things to do at the rec.
“One day a jigsaw-puzzle competition reel popped up on my Instagram feed, and I thought it would be super fun, an event for people to come together as a community for mental health and wellness.”
Jamie Wall, then special events coordinator, had previously worked for a puzzle maker, and arranged for personalized puzzles at a discount.
Donnelly added the pizza element, and Puzzle and Pie (named for the pizza, though some comers have brought dessert pies for fun) was born. The contest starts with a countdown at 4:30pm and goes for three hours.
The inaugural event went to the immodestly but then unassailably named Best Team Ever, with a time of 1 hour 16 minutes 57 seconds. Placing second with 1 hour 19 minutes were the Puzzy Wuzzy Fuzzies.
That year, Ethan Peck of the Puzzy Wuzzy Fuzzies moved to Salt Lake City with his partner, Linnea Fong, but they returned to compete in the next event. Fong Tour 23, with Fong replacing someone who had moved away, roared back, winning (in 55:34) by a mere nine seconds and three pieces.
Peck texted this year from Utah, “Unfortunately, we haven’t come back for another competition, but hopefully will next year for skiing and the puzzle competition.”
Linnea Fong, the best puzzler on their team, added, “The pressure and weight of our [2023] win was so enormous that I immediately had to go home and do a puzzle for fun.”
In 2024 the winning time was just 47:23, and last year it was 61:14.
Jessi Rochel, who has competed four times, played this year with Sara Porter, Megan Currier and a new swap-in, Alice Hackney. Rochel said her crew originally expected to be competitive. “When the first team finished, I don’t think we were halfway.”
She added, “Alice also was under the impression that we were going to be really competitive, and we had to inform her. We know better now.”
Three years ago I peered shyly into the basketball court, not wanting to distract the puzzlers. Eventually my son, Ted Benge, beckoned me in. He was playing with his now fiancee, Aisha Weinhold, and her parents, except that Aisha had departed for a Fashion Show rehearsal and only he and her father remained at the table, eyes locked downward. Nannette Weinhold, the organizer, was off smiling, eating pizza and socializing. Mark and Ted eventually finished, and that was that.
Last year I was on a team with Ted and Mark, Aisha again pulled away.
“Whoa,” said Mark, as we shook out and gazed at our puzzle pieces. “This one is hard. Lots of sky.”
The event is social but, incongruously, we just stared. I had asked my husband, Mike Benge, to stop by, and then we coerced him into service.
The first team finished, leapt up and cheered. Others did shortly. They all do, an unnerving drumbeat. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
At 7pm the organizers turned off the music. Contestants paused at our table as they, now done, ambled by.
“It was a hard one,” they’d say pityingly.
“We can finish,” we told each other, frantically inserting pieces. Nearby, staff and volunteers put away tables and chairs, threw paper plates into the trash.
“Five minutes!” organizers called out when I thought we still had 15.
We carried our last 25 pieces home on a piece of paper, and Mike and I finished the next day.
This year, Aisha, our friend Liz Melville, and I (Nannette bailed) arrived early, then hung on with rapt attention. We linked borders, tried to ignore the happy finishers, bogged down at the end. So much white sky.
“I’m never looking at the sky again,” Aisha said.
Eyes blurring, I started to question what I thought were shades of the white or forgetting what shape I was seeking. Liz, with an exasperated sigh and rolling her head to relieve neck tension, moved to the other side of the table to change perspective. As we finished, organizers were sweeping the floor. Three hours is a long time to focus. I never even touched my pizza.
The puzzle comp is tiring but (so I hear) exhilarating, and this year’s posed a whole new set of winners. Maureen Handwerker of The Pieceful Puzzlers (winning by a minute and 44 seconds, with third place a minute behind second) said, “We had so much fun! It was the first time for all of us, so we were very surprised.”
Results
- The Pieceful Puzzlers – 49:47
- Com-Devils – 51:31
- Piece, Love and Happiness – 52:22