Jimi DevineThis past weekend’s closing ceremony of the third edition of the Greenwolf’s Zalympix proved the biggest yet with DEO Farms and Wizard Trees taking home the top prize for Zoap.
The Zalympix Championship brought together the winners from the first two editions. It was easy to see why each contestant made it through their previous Zalympix effort and into Saturday’s battle of the best. There is certainly an argument to be made that it was the most heat per capita ever assembled for a pot contest.
But Zoap would be king. As we noted last year in Streets to Heat: The Deep East Oakland Farms Story, the Zoap was the #21 pheno out of the Rainbow Sherbert #16 F2 line.
But regardless of how fun Saturday night was, or the vindication of clout and hype, cannabis remained the star of the show for every second of Zalympix – though Wiz Khalifa was a close second for a bit there.
“I mean, it’s pretty badass man,” Scott from Wizard Trees told L.A. Weekly following the win. “I wasn’t really expecting after the two seconds [in the terps and taste categories] to get first overall. Regardless, I thought I was in a pretty epic competition with all those brands.”
That’s certainly a fair assessment from the Wizard Trees camp. The Zushi that almost took home its second Zalympix would fall only one place short on the podium despite having won the vote for both best terpenes and best flavor.
Blueprint would be a standout as it has for the past year since launching. The Triple Lindy took home the top honors for gassiest and most potent flower. Our top pick Cereal a la Mode from Fiore x Serge Cannabis and Powerzzzup took home the best-looking award.
Besides winning, the biggest surprise to the Wizard Trees team was how much Greenwolf scaled up Zalympix from its original edition in the midst of the pandemic.
“The first one there was probably 300 people there,” Scott said. “There was no table. There were no booth setups… But this time they scaled up and it was like 20 times bigger than the first one. That’s like a real event that was awesome to be a part of. Those guys put on a pretty epic event.”
Currently, Wizard Trees is working on a major RS-11 breeding project. Expect the results to drop as he starts phenohunting winners from the seed stock he’s built up.
In the buildup to Zalympix, DEO Farms, short for Deep East Oakland Farms, had battled pneumonia for three weeks. Before he even started talking about the win, he noted his apology to all the people who he wasn’t able to speak with on Saturday night.
“So that was like my second day outside,” DEO Farms told L.A. Weekly. “My bad to anyone who was trying to talk to me. I wasn’t as social just because I was in pretty bad shape.”
DEO Farms noted the most difficult part of the night was actually walking up on stage in the cloud of smoke to accept the award alongside Wizard Trees. He immediately headed back to the hotel to recover.
But not long after, he was able to reflect on winning the competition that means the most to him, so much so it’s the only one he enters.
“Because this is the only one I really compete in. Because to me, this is one of the more for-the-people competitions. Actual people buy the boxes and smoke,” DEO Farms said. “It’s not behind the scenes type shit. I feel like this is really a competition for the people. That’s why this is the one that I wanted to enter first.”
DEO Farms has a ton of new strains on the horizon. You can expect 10 per harvest in the months to come. Much of the new work will be Zoap hybrids playing on the now Zalympix-winning genetic line. DEO Farms started Zoap’s building blocks in 2015.
“Real breeding is a long-term endeavor, so it feels good seeing all that hard ass work actually be appreciated by the community,” DEO Farms said. “Zoap wasn’t an overnight strain. I bred it, I selected it. Me and Wizard Trees grow it. I did all the art for it. That shit is my baby right there. It just feels… what’s the word? Fulfilling! It just feels fulfilling seeing it win like that.”
After the win DEO Farms argued the biggest surprise was the scale of the love they received. The booth was lit all night long. After the win, some of DEO Farms’ friends compared the night to Michael Jordan’s famous Flu Game.
Here are the complete awards list from Zalympix:
Best Looking
Fiore x Serge Cannabis – Cereal a la Mode
Most Potent
Blueprint – Triple Lindy
Gassiest Flower
Blueprint – Triple Lindy
Best Terps
1st Place: Zushi – TENco with Blue Zushi
2nd Place: Zoap – DEO Farms x Wizard Trees
3rd Place: Biskante – Alien Labs
Best Tasting
1st Place: Zushi – TENco with Blue Zushi
2nd Place: Zoap – DEO Farms x Wizard Trees
3rd Place: Sherblato – Squintz x Foreign Genetics
Best Overall
1st Place: Zoap – DEO Farms x Wizard Trees
2nd Place: Zushi – TENco with Blue Zushi
3rd Place: Blueprint – Triple Lindy
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