A NATIONAL championships attended by thousands of people, a constant battle to break world records, and a specially-dedicated website in Gwent which received more than 3,000 hits during the first week of its launch.

It sounds like one of the UK's top sports and conjures images of nervous athletes waiting for the bang of the starter's gun.

But these competitors are armed only with a greenhouse, good seed, good ground and, hopefully, good luck.

They are giant vegetable growers, and two men are leading the way in the world of mammoth pumpkins and champion cucumbers.

Brothers Kevin Fortey, 27, and Gareth, 25, of Cwmbran, launched their new website, www.giantveg.co.uk, at the National Giant Vegetable Championship last weekend.

The website was set up in memory of their father, Mike, who died of a heart attack, aged 53, in 1996.

He started the giant veg craze in the UK in the 1980s when he held a pumpkin competition at the Mill Tavern pub in Cwmbran.

The brothers have continued his good work at the family home in Cwmbran where they grow more than 20 varieties of vegetables in greenhouses on the quarter-of-an-acre garden.

Gareth, a trainee solicitor, said: "We obviously inherited our passion for giant vegetable growing from our father.

"We're never going to run the 100m in under 10 seconds so this is our niche really."

The giant vegetable enthusiasts get a buzz from trying to beat both national and world records. They currently hold the Welsh record for the heaviest marrow - a whopping 110lb - and won four first prizes at the National Championship in Shepton Mallet last weekend for their 31inch cucumber, 22lb cucumber, three pound tomato and eight-and-a-half pound melon.

Gareth added: "With normal vegetable growing there's nothing to put your name in history. You can have the most perfect onion in the world but nobody will remember it.

"But everyone will remember a 25lb onion."