I may be a mere mortal but I still think I’m bigger than 68 hot dogs 
I like the Italian guy’s moniker, the “Italian Scallion”. It has a nice ring to it.
This reminds me of a famous Japanese girl, “Gal Sone” who goes on variety shows and stuff to eat absurd quantities of food. It’s not the same as competitive eating, since she’s not doing it under a small time frame, but she does eat it all in one sitting. She’s tiny but must have a crazy stomach! This is a link to her on a show eating about 20 lbs of curry, noodle, and rice. She weighed in at 95 lbs beforehand, and 110 afterward.
I probably don’t want to know where the missing 5 lbs went.
I pity the guy who asks her out, takes her to dinner and then watches why she consumes 16 steaks.
She never had a second date.
I am amazed at the accomplishments of competitive eaters. Surely they can be recognized for their incredible gustitory feats.
According to an episode of MTV’s True Life I saw from a few years ago on competitive eating, it happens. For most, it’s just practice, of course. But Kobayashi actually works out. As in a gym. A lot. If you saw his body during that episode, it’s something. Pro-athlete ripped. He believes it helps, and a factor in his success or failure. Hell, he even watched video of his previous year’s run to see what he could learn from it. He takes it VERY seriously (as do Japanese in general, he seemed to indicate).
ETA: As for the complaints about the event that come up every time it’s mentioned, I look at it this way: it’s a once a year, one day event. I’m betting the extra food it “wastes” in that microcosm of time pales severely in comparison to what the average American throws away (food-wise) in just a month. Maybe even less.
http://www.ifoce.com/eaters.php It is more than just Nathans. But is a sense no food is wasted. It is all eaten.
The records are listed. Who would eat 7 1/2 lbs of butter in one sitting?
Missed this one …
… the difference is, people don’t *need *to run or swim. If a person never runs or never swims he won’t die. This is the difference, in my view. Taking an activity that every person on earth needs to do to not die … one that a great many miss out on to varying degrees … and making it a competition of who can do the most of it for no reason whatsoever besides money and the ability to say, “look at what a pig I am” is what I find offensive.
People will compete on almost any human endeavor. It is the nature of the beast. Is anyone bitching about the money wasted training Olympic athletes? We spend a lot on that stuff. We could always stop the Olympics and spend the money on operations for children. But that is not going to happen. We compete.
I bet Michael Phelps eats far more calories in a year than every single one of those guys purely for reasons of competition. Clearly he should be ostracized.
I wanna know if there’s some kinda commercial grade toilet they have at home, you know, for the next day.
I heard a commercial on the radio a few years back. It was for some kind of high-volume toilet. The husband was having his competitive eating team over for practice… 
BTW, here is Joey Chestnut eating a 72 ounce steak plus sides in under 9 minutes. Broke the old record by 58 seconds.
The family must force them to sit on the porch the next day. Sixty hoot dogs would result in a tiny flatulence problem.