Takeru Kobayashi, six-time world record hot dog eater, is claiming to have a jaw injury which may hamper his competition today at Nathan's Famous in Coney Island, Brooklyn, New York. Some think the champ is faking, playing head games with Joey Chestnut, who beat Kobayashi's record of 59 1/2 franks and buns two weeks ago. The two are the favorites in this year's event at Nathan's.
Would Kobayashi really pull such a stunt, potentially tarnishing the great sport of competitive eating?
As an aside, this article I'm linking to refers to the governing body as the International Federation of Competitive Eating (IFOCE). I thought I had read that they changed their name to Major League Eating recently. I'll have to check.
Scandal in professional gluttony?
Okay, I checked. From Wikipedia:
The IFOCE, which first established eating as a sport in the 1990s, has recently launched Major League Eating to serve as an umbrella for competitive eating worldwide while also providing a recognized brand for licensing of t-shirts and other products. The Major League Eating website, www.majorleagueeating.com, is considered the most dynamic website in this sport. It features videos of contests and eaters and offers a complete online community similar to MySpace, for eating fans.
UPDATE: Sore jaw or not, Kobayashi lost to Joey Chestnut, meaning the Mustard Yellow Belt has returned to American, where it belongs, damn it! NO ONE outeats us. USA! USA!
Comments
I can't believe I lead the sort of existence where I hear about the sport injuries of recod hot-dog eaters. Not just in one place, but several. How does that happen to a person?
After the commercial break they came back and Kobayashi had 63 dogs. Second place. Joey beat him with 66. (How it went up 3 I'm not sure, but the numbers during the competition were "unofficial".)
On a somewhat related note, or maybe not, does anyone find it odd that the SWISS are the defending America's Cup champs? Here we are with all that ocean around us and the defending champs are a bunch of guys whose biggest body of water is a moderate lake. It's our cup, actually named after the yacht America but who cares, give it back or we'll sue.