In April 2002, Bread Bakers Guild Team USA took second place at the Coupe du Monde de la Boulangerie (World Cup of Baking) in Paris, France, narrowly edged out by a talented Japanese team.

Considered the Olympics of baking, the intense competition featured teams from 12 countries trying to outdo each other in three categories: Baguette and Specialty Breads, Viennoiserie and Artistic Design. Held every three years, the Coupe de Monde is the world's only competition where bakers who practice the craft of artisan baking can compete against the many Old World traditions of the various countries involved.

Through a combination of diligent practices, insatiable curiosity about technique, experimentation and sensitive coaching, the U.S. team astounded the world with its thrilling success.

With its silver medal, Team USA was nosed out by the Japanese team by what seemed the thinnest of margins. In training, team members focused on old-style baking: gentle mixing, equally gentle handling of the dough, and baking at a lower temperature and allowing to rise for longer periods of time.

Certainly, the results of this year's Coupe de Monde tell the story. When classical technique is married to an inventive use of ingredients unhindered by a strict adherence to tradition, wonderful baked products can result. Each team at the competition was required to complete products within a nine-hour period for three categories of baked goods: breads including the baguette, laminated sweet pastries including variations on Danish and croissants, and an artistic piece.

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From team captain Tim Foley's Mount Hood loaf (a rye/white/wheat loaf studded with candied hazelnuts) to Tim Healea's gibassier, a Provence-inspired sweet bread flavored with orange peel, orange-blossom water, anise and olive oil, to Ciril Hitz' artistic use of grains and vegetable powders for color in the sculptural piece, the American team impressed the judges, not only with the look of its products, but also their taste.

Yet the U.S. team encountered stiffer-than-expected competition from the Japanese. "In previous years, the Japanese products looked great, but the taste was not exciting," says Craig Ponsford, team coach in 1999 and 2002, former Coupe du Monde competitor, and owner of Artisan Bakers in Sonoma, Calif. "This year, their technical virtuosity was matched with an earnest effort to make the products taste great. It was their year to win gold. Coming in as champions, the American team knew that everybody would be judging us harder than ever before."

Ponsford adds that team USA faced very stiff competition from the "experts" - teams from countries renown for their artisan bread - and newcomers such as the Irish, who entered the prestigious competition for the first time this year. Nonetheless, "I'm so proud of the team," Ponsford says. "They worked very hard and it showed. Winning second place in an international competition of this caliber is a true victory."

"The Coupe's underlying mission is to keep alive the craft of baking." Says Healea, head baker at The Pearl Bakery, a pre-eminent artisanal operation in Portland Ore. "When developing the products for the competition, we always had in mind the flavor, originality and appearance of each item, and also the feasibility of making them in a real bakery."

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Foley, baker and owner of Bit of Swiss Pastry Shoppe in Stevensville, Mich., acknowledges the amount of time and patience that went into preparing for competition of this caliber. "The actual recipe-development process has been the hardest part considering you start with a thought, compose a formula, make a preferment that develops for 12 hours, and then only 18 hours later do you know if it worked or not. If it didn't, then it was back to the drawing boards again and more waiting."

Finishing with just 14 seconds to spare, the American team had practiced its routine so often during the six months prior to the competition that members knew almost by instinct when they were ahead or behind schedule. When it appeared that Foley would be racing the clock to complete his baguettes ("the epitome of the balance between taste, crumb, shape and volume," in his words), Hitz, with his artistic piece done pitched in to help by pulling Foley's breads out of the oven.

Foley sums up his experience this way" "Though we didn't win a first prize, we really put our best product out that day, and just the road we traveled to get to Paris was a trophy for our team. Along with their green-tea brioche with a sweet-bean filling and the cornbread shaped like an ear of corn, the Japanese artistic piece, a kind of bonsai garden made of dough, deserved the win. I think that the judging was fair, but the real thrill was in simply getting there. Anyone who competes in the Coupe de Monde comes out a winner."

Healea concurs. "The best thing about the competition was meeting bakers from around the world and enjoying the real feeling of camaraderie among the teams, despite the language barriers," he says. "I'm especially proud of what we accomplished at the Coupe because I think the work we did really adhered to the spirit of the competition. We truly experienced what it is to develop new and innovative breads, products and ideas using traditional methods."

Have questions about baking or competing in the Coupe du Monde? Email Tim at info@bitofswiss.com.