Famed aggressive eater Joey Chestnut reclaimed his title Friday on the Nathan’s Well-known Fourth of July sizzling canine consuming contest after after skipping final yr’s gastronomic battle in New York for the coveted Mustard Belt.
Chestnut, 41, consumed 70½ sizzling canines and buns in 10 minutes, falling in need of his file of 76 wieners and buns set on July 4, 2021. It marked the seventeenth win in 20 appearances for the Westfield, Indiana, eater on the internationally televised competitors, which he missed in 2024 over a contract dispute.
Defending champion within the girls’s division, Miki Sudo of Tampa, Florida, received her eleventh title, downing 33 canines, besting a dozen opponents. Final yr, she ate a file 51.
A big crowd, many sporting foam sizzling canine hats, witnessed the annual eat-a-thon, held exterior the unique Nathan’s Well-known restaurant in Coney Island, Brooklyn, since 1972. Many confirmed as much as see Chestnut’s much-awaited return to an occasion he has known as “a cherished custom, a celebration of American tradition, and an enormous a part of my life.”
Chestnut bested 14 fellow opponents from throughout the U.S. and internationally, together with Australia, the Czech Republic, Ontario, England and Brazil.
Final yr, Main League Consuming occasion organizer George Shea mentioned Chestnut wouldn’t be collaborating within the contest as a result of a contract dispute. Chestnut had struck a cope with a competing model, the plant-based meat firm Unimaginable Meals.
Chestnut advised The Related Press final month that he had by no means appeared in any commercials for the corporate’s vegan sizzling canines and that Nathan’s is the one sizzling canine firm he has labored with. However Chestnut acknowledged he “ought to have made that extra clear with Nathan’s.”
Final yr, Chestnut ate 57 canines — in solely 5 minutes — in an exhibition with troopers at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas. He mentioned that occasion was “wonderful” and he was happy to nonetheless have an opportunity to eat sizzling canines — numerous them — on July Fourth.
“I am completely happy I did that, however I am actually completely happy to be again at Coney Island,” he mentioned.
Final yr in New York, Patrick Bertoletti of Chicago wolfed up a 58 to earn the lads’s title.