Joey Chestnut won one for America this past 4th of July by retaining his title of Hot Dog Eating Champion. He faced off against six-time champ Takeru Kobayashi and 20 other competitors Friday morning at Nathan’s on Coney Island. He won in pretty dramatic fashion, taking the competition into its first-ever sudden death competition–Chestnut and Kobayashi had to eat five dogs as fast as they could to determine the winner.
This competition has been going on since the early 1900s, but this recent showing boasted some pretty hefty coverage by ESPN. They somehow managed to stretch the event to an hour-long special, interviewing the competitors, traveling around the world to their home town, and giving some detailed stats about the event. It was hysterical, to say the least, and I’m glad that ESPN was able to spend such time and money on this absurdity.
You know what the topper to all of this is? The upcoming WiiWare game called Major League Eating: The Game takes “popular” eaters and allows gamers everywhere to stuff their faces… virtually. I guess once you’re done playing that game, you can just pop in Wii Fit and lose the pounds.
