That means Americans don’t watch much tennis, not that they watch competitive eating. And that was the peak viewership of the contest. It gets a little bit more than half of that these days.
The large (by non-sports standards) viewership is almost certainly due to a combination of having it on a national holiday and putting it on ESPN/ESPN2. And even then, barely clearing a million viewers is hardly a big deal. Random Yankees games get a quarter of that in the NY region alone with regular season games against rivals like the Red Sox easily beat it. It simply means the 4th of July isn’t the greatest sports news day.
Most of them he just destroys whatever standing record there is for that challenge, and the ones where he struggles aren’t as much fun. As someone who typically eats not very much food in one sitting, slowly, it’s fascinating, but definitely up to a limit.
This is objectively not correct. By your standards I obviously have Level 0 awareness of this phenomenon, meaning that I was dimly aware that there were occasions where people stuffed their faces with as much as they could eat as fast as possible, but I couldn’t name any specific event and assumed that this sort of activity was basically at the level of some sort of county fair silliness. And I’d definitely never heard of Joey Chestnut or any of his competitors.
And yet I look around at my surroundings, and it’s definitely not a cave. Go figure!
It’s very niche, it’s one of those things that I expect most Americans know exists but few Americans pay any attention to. Like water polo.
And it’s not exclusively American. I’m not even sure it’s most popular in America. For background, the first reported instance of competitive eating took place in England in 1630 where a man named Nicholas Wood was renowned for his success in eating large amounts of food.
Then in 1878 the first recorded pie eating contest took place in Toronto, Canada. That started a fad of such contests across Canada and the United States afterwards.
The three countries best known for competitive eating are the United States, Canada, and Japan.
You live in Canada thought, right? Here I’d be mildly surprised. I’ve never watched competitive eating yet I know Joey Chestnut and Kobayashi and that it’s a Nathan’s event. Though Dopers are not as pop culture conscious as most people, I don’t think, and I certainly have found myself on the “living in a
cave” side of things.
Competitive eating isn’t anywhere close to being a niche thing. Joey Chestnut and the Nathan’s competition aren’t even the premier stars. That honor, IMHO, goes to the show Man vs. Food, and it’s previous and current star, Adam Richman and Casey Webb respectively.
Far from being some kind of circus side show or freak show type thing, it’s presented as good clean family fun. There’s typically an audience, with small children cheering on the star as they take on the challenge of the week.
Joey Chestnut appeared on that show with Adam when they visited San Jose. Chestnut devoured a burrito the size of a man’s arm in about 3 minutes. The crowd had to stand back so as to not let any stray hands or fingers near him while he ate.
See, now those names I don’t know. I mean, Adam Richman vaguely rings a bell, and I’ve heard of Man v Food, but I have no idea who that other guy is, nor would I know who Adam Richman is out of context. Joey Chestnut and Kobayashi I feel like I’ve known for like a decade or possibly more.
Sonya Thomas, AKA The Black Widow has defeated many men and women in competitive eating contests. She has won the Nathan’s women’s hot dog contest. On a pound for pound basis she may be the best competitive eater of all time.
There’s also Joel Hansen from Canada, who travels around doing food challenges. I don’t know how he stacks up against other youtube mega eaters, but he can really pack it away. He’s talked about not entering competitions like Nathan’s because of rules that would limit his other opportunities.
It’s a single TV show, that does nothing to disprove the idea that it’s a niche thing.
Note that I’ve seen the show and I know who Casey Webb is, but I watch a lot of food-related shows on Food Network and Travel Channel, so I’m pretty familiar with most of those celebrities. Casey appears on a lot of other food-related shows (often as a judge or commentator on cooking competition shows) so I mostly know him from other things.
Competitive eating seems like a subset of culinary competitions, which are mostly about people showing off various cooking skills (baking, stovetop cooking, barbecue) but the ability to eat quickly/large amounts has some overlap.
Funny enough, it was the early 1970s where hot dog eating contests really seemed to start. The exact origins are a bit murky because there was a lot of intentional misinformation spread to make it seem like it went back a lot farther. (You will sometimes see it reported that it has been held annually since 1916 but that was due to a publicity stunt hoax that caught legs.) Actual recorded events of the contest only go back as far as 1972, so that’s generally considered to be when it started, though supposedly there were unrecorded contests earlier. There was one event that occurred in 1967 that was recorded, though there are few details about it (including whether or not it involved only eating hotdog wieners or buns were also involved). The only info I can find is that someone named Walter Paul, a “400 pound 32-year-old truck driver” won.
It wasn’t until the late 1990s/2000s that it started getting national attention. The first televised event was in 2003 on ESPN, though that was tape-delayed, and live events started being broadcast in 2004. Much of that was spurred by the rivalry between Joey Chestnut and Takeru Kobayashi.
My first exposure to the thing was from the cartoon King of the Hill, which in 2002 had an episode called “The Fat and the Furious” where celebrity hot dog eaters were featured.
Am I allowed to call this thread a nothing burger?
The idea competitive eaters can only participate in specific contests is the one and only reason I do not consider this a serious sport.
If the goal is to give lots of advertising to a weak competitor, so be it. I doubt Nathan’s sales would be even affected. If you want to sell hot dogs, what better way then to encourage gluttony and excess?
I don’t watch competitive eating. However, I know the names Joey Chestnut and Kobayashi. I love the name Joey Chestnut. Does being named after a food give you a deeper interest in speed eating? Joey Chestnut sounds like a made up name. The guy who tells tall tales about tahini. Possibly a Christmas squirrel. Certainly a professional eater.
Is the contest popular because of its stars? If so, the policy is odd. ‘Course, it makes the news anyway, so maybe all these additives are good for all the hot dog companies. I don’t see vegan hot dogs as healthier, really.
