Ben Russell, an Eagle River High School freshman, holds his award-winning size 7 Nike's. Russell won the 33rd annual National Odor-Eaters Rotten Sneaker Contest, held in Montpelier, Vt., March 19. Photo submitted by Rob Fisher

Russell and his decrepit and odorous size 7 Nike's won the 33rd annual National Odor-Eaters Rotten Sneaker Contest, March 19 in Montpelier, Vt. He beat out seven other contestants, from Michigan, Utah, Georgia, California, New Jersey, Vermont and New Mexico to bring home the grand prize of $2,500.

Russell qualified for the national championships during the 2007 Bear Paw Festival, drawing inspiration from his sister, Hannah Russell, who won the Bear Paw contest the year before, and went on to place second nationally.

“After she won, I had to do what I could to win,” Ben Russell said. “So I took a pair of shoes I'd worn fishing and started doing whatever I could to make them really rotten.”

The champion confessed his sneakers got so dirty and smelly through two years of hard play, motorcycle riding, hunting and camping. But his secret weapon was the frequent trips on the family fishing boat.

After winning the Bear Paw title, Russell stowed the shoes away in a garbage bag and kept them in the garage.

“They were worse when I finally pulled them out for the national contest,” he said. “There was mold growing on the outside and inside of the shoes. I think that helped me win.”

The contest began in 1975 as a way to help a local sporting goods store sell shoes, and grew into a national event in 1988, when Odor-Eaters assumed sponsorship of the event. Now it has fermented into the ultimate test of just how offensive sneakers belonging to children between the ages of 5 and 15 can get.

Sneakers were judged on the conditions of the sole, tongue, heel, toe, laces or Velcro, eyelets/grommets, overall condition and, most important, odor, by a panel that includes Master Sniffer George Aldrich, a chemical specialist for NASA space missions, and Rachel Herz, author of “The Scent of Desire,” and a professor at Brown University.

In addition to winning the Golden Sneaker Award trophy, Russell also won an all-expense paid trip to New York City to see the Broadway show “The Lion King” and a much-needed supply of Odor-Eaters products to kick out the odor from his sneakers.

Russell's sneakers were enshrined in the Odor-Eaters “Hall of Fumes” in Montpelier, Vt., with past contest winners.

This marks the fourth time an Alaskan has claimed the Rotten Sneaker title, a feat most recently accomplished by McKenna Dinkel of Wasilla, who won the grand prize at the 31st annual Rotten Sneaker contest.

“We're getting pretty good at this,” said Susie Gorski, executive director of the Chugiak-Eagle River Chamber of Commerce, which organizes the annual Bear Paw Festival. “In addition to having smelly sneakers, I think the cachet of being from Alaska doesn't hurt the contestants.”

Reach the reporter at darrell.breese@alaskastar.com.

This article published in The Alaska Star on Thursday, April 3, 2008.