New Yorker is top dog, reclaims title in eating contest
NEW YORK - Joey Chestnut reclaimed the top spot at the annual hot dog eating contest in Coney Island yesterday after first tying with archrival Takeru Kobayashi in a 10-minute chow-down and then beating him in a five-dog eat-off.
The men tied at 59 frankfurters in 10 minutes, before being made to gobble another five dogs in a tiebreaker. They consumed 64 hot dogs total and were looking quite peaked after the competition.
Kobayashi had hoped to reclaim the throne after a disappointing three-dog loss last year shattered his six-year winning streak.
"He wanted it, but I needed it," Chestnut said of his Japanese rival.
Thousands gathered at Coney Island on the Fourth of July to watch the gluttonous gladiators compete in the annual event. Chestnut emerged victorious for the second year in a row, beating 20 others who had 10 minutes to scarf down as many hot dogs as possible, two fewer minutes than in previous years.
The regulation time was changed after it was revealed that the original competition in 1916 was 10 minutes long. The switch made for a tense competition.
Chestnut quickly pulled ahead, with cheeks puffed as he crammed hot dogs into his mouth. At one point, the 24-year-old Californian led Kobayashi 14 to 11.
Kobayashi fell to third place, but ate his way back, and the two went dog to dog in the final stretch. After a frankfurter photo finish, the judges decided it was a tie.
Richard Shea, one of the founders of the International Federation of Competitive Eating, said it was the first time in his memory the contest went into overtime.
As usual, Kobayashi's strategy was to eat all the dogs first, then dunk the buns and eat them. A pause while swallowing the soggy buns meant defeat.
"He should've won it; it was his to win," judge Gersh Kuntzman said of the 30-year-old from Nagano, Japan.
The 128-pound legend in the competitive eating circuit told Brooklyn papers that he wasn't feeling 100 percent, and while he was improving, the tooth problem and sore jaw that hampered last year's performance were still something of a problem.
Their competitors also included a pizza cook from New York City, a fishmonger from Chicago, and a 110-pound mother of two from Maryland.
