BUFFALO, N.Y. -- This weekend, more than 300 Republicans from the Erie County Committee voted in a presidential straw poll.

"It was at -3 (degrees) Saturday morning so I think it just shows you the energy and excitement and enthusiasm that there is for our Republican electorate going forward," ECRC Chairman Nick Langworthy said.

New York real estate mogul Donald Trump won with 57 percent of the vote, which was more than 40 points better than the next closest candidate.

"The exciting thing is we had many people that came from outside of our normal committee system or elected officials or your traditional Republicans you see all the time, so there were many new faces," Langworthy said.

Both he and former gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino, who spoke on behalf of Trump at the event, believe the straw poll is indicative of how local Republicans feel.

"Being informed and being as diverse as they were from all areas of the county, I would say they bring to the table the will of the people that they know," Paladino said.

Paladino is leading the Trump supporters in Western New York, and with a majority of Republicans apparently on his side, said he's even more motivated to stump for Trump statewide.

"What it means for the convention is that Carl Paladino and the people in league with me will be irritants," he said. "We'll be irritating like you've never seen irritation."

Paladino says he'll be irritating the state party establishment and chairman Ed Cox, who he believes does not want to endorse Trump. On March 4, with the state party convention in Buffalo, he said Cox will be on his turf.

"I think he had a bad hair day when he did that, but that's to our advantage so I didn't say anything. I'm very, very happy about it," Cox said.

Meanwhile, Langworthy said the straw poll has already sent a clear message to the rest of the state party.

"Just seeing the results that we got on social networking after we released the information, you can tell there is a great deal of people tuning into this right now," he said.

Early in the presidential process, Langworthy supported Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker who has since dropped out of the race. With this weekend's results in mind, Langworthy said there's a good chance he'll make a new endorsement soon.