Thanks gang! That actually was smoke in the shots (I waited for the pyrotechnics). I got a "teaser" shot last year with a plane against the smoke backdrop, but it was a little blurry. So this year, I was waiting for the smoke to make a more dramatic sky.
As for the DA*300 vs the Bigma, yes you can see the difference pretty easily at full resolution, though my DA*300 shots were much closer, so I don't know how it would have compared at the same distance, but cropped.
The Bigma does well, though, for the range, and it's the perfect one-lens solution when you're carrying other cargo (especially precious cargo). Someone asked my to compare the two lenses, and I said the DA*300 killed the Bigma at 300mm, but the Bigma easily won the 50-299mm range AND the 301-500 range.