I suppose vomiting during the competition is considered a foul, but what about after it’s all finished? If someone eats 50 hot dogs or whatever, regardless of whether they won, do they just go the rest of the day with that sitting in their gut?
I find it hard to beleive they would. Even if you can get all that food down, you’re going to feel pretty crappy for the next few hours at least. But if you just puke it all up, or at least some of it, you probably feel a lot better right away.
And that doesn’t even consider the health effects of ingesting so much in calories and fat, etc., all at once. Even without considering those, it seems these people would want to get rid of all that food just for comfort reasons.
Every article I have read on it say when the contestants (or perhaps they are athletes because it does get the occasional ESPN coverage) are done eating, vomiting is common. I remember watching a special on competitive eaters and one of the main problems cited by experts was damage to the esophagus caused by acid fromt the vomit. It also showed some damage to the teeth from the acid caused by throwing up.
And it seems that regurgitation of any kind is a disqualifier.
More importantly; doe these guys become obese? i can’t imagine anything that would turn you off on food-than actually stuffing down 100 hotdogs in an hour! Bleecchhh!
It’s only a disqualifier once it leaves the mouth. There was some controversy regarding one of Takeru Kobayashi’s victories at the annual hot dog eating contest when he vomited but slurped it all back up quickly:
In general, as FormerMarineGuy said, most participants vomit afterwards–I read an interview with Kobayashi where he said he does; there are some who say they don’t–Joe “Deep Dish” Bertolletti says he rarely does, and Ed “Cookie” Jarvis says he doesn’t but that, uh…it all comes out the other way rather uncomfortably.
That leads to another question. If you consume 50 hot dogs and throw it up five minutes later, how much stomach acid could there be to damage the esophagus and teeth? It’s not like the food has been marinating for an hour. It just went down and came right back up. Seems to me it wouldn’t have much acid content at that point.
I do not know the specifics of the workings of the human stomach or body, but my guess is if it gets to the stomach, there is stomach acid that settles with the food immediately. If the food is forced back up, I think it is safe to assume that the stomach acid works its way up with the regurgitated food.