All You Need To Know About the 2008 Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest

If you are baffled by Kobayashi's being as skinny as Lindsay Lohan while simultaneously being better than the Fridge at eating Tube-steak, this primer is for you.

Who: The Competition is put on by Nathan's Famous Corporation who supplies the hot dogs and venue.

In order to gain entry into the contest a competitor must compete in a qualifying event. No contestant can compete in more than three qualifiers in a given year. Also once a competitor has won a qualifying contest they may not compete in any others that year. Currently there are 23 qualifying events held internationally.

Last years Winner was Joey Chestnut with 66 hot dogs. Chestnut upset the incumbent champion Kobayashi who had held the title from 2001 to 2006.

Kobayashi's nickname is "the Tsunami". Cool!

For Competitive Eaters this is the Super Bowl.

What: Chicken butt!

...No really, the hot dogs probably have chicken feces in them.

Where: Each year the hot dog eating contest is held on Coney Island. Coney Island is best known as the backdrop for the weirdest gang related movie of all time.

It also is a board-walky, beach island in New York city. I hear there is great skee ball.

When: Every year on July fourth since 1916.

The first contest was won by James Mullen, who ate 13 hot dogs (what a puss). Since 1916 the competition has been taken much more seriously and is actually considered by some to be a sport.

Some don't see it as a sport but rather they see it as a sign or symbol of the watering down of American culture in to gluttonous, 10 minute, ADD-friendly events.

meh. Those people probably were nerds in high school.

Why: Because who cares about starving kids?

NO ONE!

"cause people are starving to death and that's just not ballin' to me"

How: Most competitors use the Solomon method. That means that they rip the actual frankfurter in half then eat it. After that they eat the bun.

YUM!

Eating the dogs and buns separately was pioneered by Kazutoyo Arai and is sometimes referred to as the "Tokyo method" or "Japanesing".

Another well known technique is to dip the hot dog and bun (or sometimes just bun) in water to help it go down.

If you find yourself eating a hot dog his summer and need it to slide down your pie-tube a little faster consider your options: 1. cold, refreshing, (preferably hoppy) beer OR 2. lukewarm tap water.

hmm...

Is this a part of the Summer Olympics? Well not yet. Although many of these eaters seem more athletic than synchronized swimmers.

Will I get laid if I'm good at this sport? Doubtful.

Does a piece of America die every time a foreigner wins a hot dog eating contest on July fourth? Yes. Without question.

Oops! I forgot to segue to the end! Well there you have it. An almost sport that is pretty gross and makes me want to vomit. Have a great fourth of July and good luck staying out of the emergency room!

14 Comments On: "All You Need To Know About the 2008 Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest"

 
Unless I missed it somewhere, "All you need to know...." does not tell you what time the contest is held. It seems this is pretty important. I'd like to watch it on TV, so could you kindly let us know this important fact? Thanks for a great article! Superstan

It's on ESPN right now!!!!

USA Wins 2008 Event. 5 Hot Dog eat off and Joey wins over the Tsunami again.

Coney Island is not, in fact, an Island, it is part of Brooklyn, which is of course, attached to Queens and Long Island.

touche. I didn't think to check if Coney island was like Rhode Island. Thanks for the heads up.

I think I was trying to make a point about the cruelty of humanity and the fact that in the end we are all just tiny islands floating around in space living useless, meaningless lives that are completely unconnected from history and our peers.

OR

I'm an idiot blogger.

No kidding, Superstan. I've been looking online for 30 minutes just trying to find the TIME it's on. My stupid paper doesn't have it listed. How are we supposed to watch it/place our bets??? UGH.

I suppose you think Manhattan isn't really an island,too.

Guys... Nathan's website is finally up (it's been crashed for over an hour). The contest is at Noon on ESPN. I figured it'd be later. Have a great day.

"Official" lines from Faux Betting: :-)

Propositions
Over/Under - 68
Number of Contestants who Vomit During Event - 2

Event Winner
USA - 150
NonUSA + 130

not only was the 2007 hot dog contest RIGGED, 2008 justifies it. in 07 chestnut magically pulled 3 dogs ahead, and on top of that they already added hot dogs to his count prior to that. if they count if correctly and not cheated, kobayashi is the winner. in 08 around the 45+ mark there close, but after 50 kobayashi pulls away with about a three hot dog lead. theres two counters one on the screen and one on stage. both counters were different throughout the entire contest. towards the end you can see the ref coutners telling the counter on stage to flip the numbers for kobayashi, but they dont. so he is basically stuck at around 53 even after he is still eating. even in the tiebreaker, you can clearly see that chestnut mishandles a hot dog and it falls to the floor, and even the announcer is like pointing to the dog on the floor. towards the end the announcers even say kobayashi is in the lead with 1 hot dog to go. a slip second later, there like its over chestnut is the winner. i was like wtf. something is wrong with this contest for real. it is completely rigged and kobayashi was cheated. if i were him i would be pissed as fuk. he knos hes being cheated he should say somethin. and wtf is that moving the contest to 10 minutes, there like well we checked the rule book back in the day, and its supposed to be a 10 minute contest. THAT SHIET IS WRITTEN IN PENCIL FOR GODSAKE!

*split

oh snap, cheap shot at synchronized swimming

koby was cheated

I guess nobody saw Kobay have a reversal of fortune last year and it wasn't called. Joey is the champ so get used to it.

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