Rexburg woman wins first place in Elk Calling Championship

There’s a new champ in town. The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation just named its first place winner in the women’s division of the World Elk Calling Championship. She’s from Rexburg, and she says she was surprised by her win.

“It was really exciting, it was a good time. What’s wonderful is that there was a lot of support and a lot of people that were congratulating me and it was really just neat to be able to meet people that were there at the competition as well and be supported by everybody there and be cheered on,” said Marisa Pagano.

She says she credits her win to her coach. Her husband won first place in the men’s division this year. He says he’s very proud of his wife.

“I had a feeling the whole time she was going to win because we’ve been practicing hours and hours over the last couple of months. Two months ago she couldn’t even use a diaphragm and she goes from not being able to use it at all to winning the women’s world championship. So, pretty blessed and humbled,” says Damian Pagano.

Each one took first place their first year competing. They say as far as they know, they’re the first couple to both win first in their division.