Wetass Sport #27–Competitive Eating: July 4th is approaching, and down at Nathan’s hot dogs on Coney Island that means only one thing: the Super Bowl of speed eating, which is to say the annual spectacle in which people of all shapes and sizes try to cram as many hot dogs and buns down their gullets as they can. You probably think that this is just a minor event, a sideshow in the world of sport. But there is evidence to the contrary. Exhibit 1: Nathan’s just inaugurated a 50 foot by 70 foot Hot Dog Eating Wall Of Fame. On it are such names as Mike “the Scholar” DeVito, Ed “the Animal” Krachie, Krazy Kevin Lipsitz and Hungry Charles Hardy, as well as a clock counting down to the annual gorge-fest. Exhibit 2: there exists–and I swear I am not making this up–an International Federation Of Competitive Eaters (or IFCE). This worthy entity sets the standards and keeps track of all the face-stuffing that goes on around the world. There you can discover some truly amazing eating records, such as: it took a guy named Donald Lerman just 1 minute and 48 seconds to eat 6 pounds of baked beans (whew, better stay away from ol’ Don). Lerman has also polished off 7 quarter pound butter sticks (lightly salted) in the course of 5 minutes (presumably not right after he ate the beans). Anyhow, among other things, there are records for cabbage (6 pounds 9 ounces in 9 minutes), Cannoli (21 in 6 minutes), and oysters (an astonishing 36 dozen in just 10 minutes). This last record was set by a woman named Sonya Thomas, who weighs just 105 pounds and owns an incredible 11 records (65 hard boiled eggs in 6 minutes?! Holy Guacamole, Sonya! Even Cool Hand Luke couldn’t do that). Anyhow, the champion of champions is a Japanese dude called Takeru Kobayashi, who tips the scales at 132 pounds, and is prominent on the Nathan’s Wall Of Fame. He’s like the Mike Tyson of competitive eating, dominating the big contests since 2003. He has gulped down 50.5 hot dogs and buns in 12 minutes, and 20 pounds or rice balls (yes pounds, more than 1/7th of his entire body weight) in 30 minutes. But the eating achievement that really impresses me, that sets Kobayashi high above all those poseurs on Fear Factor who gag, groan and hurl, is the fact that Kobayashi once ate 57 cow brains (that’s 17.7 pounds worth) in 15 minutes. Just hope they weren’t British (mad) cow brains, because this guy is already crazy enough…



Kobayashi At Work: “Damn, I knew I shouldn’t have eaten that big breakfast…”