Several new videos of Japanese competitive eating programs have been posted to youtube. The 2002 rookie contest, which is over an hour long, has been uploaded in its entirety. The top two finishers in that contest were women (the runner up is quite cute) who did not compete in this year’s “Gluttonous Queen” contest. There is also footage from the New Year’s Eve competitive eaters party of Kobayashi competing aganist an unknown woman in a restaurant where sushi is delivered on conveyor belts. Some brief clips of Tomoko Miyake eating sausage have also been posted.

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(from speedeat.com) Joe Menchetti will appear on CBS’ Early Show to promote Frank’s Red Hot wing eating contest to be held at the AVP beach volleyball contest on Coney Island Saturday. The expected time of the appearance is 8:36 am eastern. franksredhot.com has more information about the contest. go-brooklyn.com says the contest will take place at 3pm and registration will occur from 10 am to 11:30 am.

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(from bloomberg.com) Heinz announced that Nelson Peltz, who wants to pay $200,000 to cosponsor Nathan’s hot dog eating contest, may have won one or two seats on its board based on preliminary vote counts. Peltz had hoped to win up to five seats. Full voting results will not be announced until September 15.

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Brian Seiken has created a video montage of the eaters who helped make the IFOCE what it is today and posted it on his site.

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(from Reuters) Heinz announced that it will not announce the results of its voting at its annual meeting today or tomorrow. Nelson Peltz, who wants Heinz to cosponsor Nathan’s hot dog eating contest, is attempting to install 5 new board members. Heinz provided no date when it expected to announce the results.

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Speedeat.com has returned after about a month’s hiatus. Joe Menchetti attended the ribs contest in Fairfield, CT and has a brief report.

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Adam Ash has a long review of “Insatiable” / “Horsemen of the Esophagus”. He dislikes the subject matter at first, but likes Fagone’s book.

Updated 8/12 2:05 am – Jason Fagone says Adam Ash’s review was plagiarized from a Sunday Telegraph review by William Leith

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(From mosesnews.com)
Nathan’s Famous announces that quarterly profits increased by 19.4% in the quarter ending June 25. Sales increased 7.6% and sales of hot dogs to food service companies increased by 17.8% Other revenues (including TV fees) increased just 1.6% (with the increase in TV ratings for 2006, it will be interesting to see if that figure will increase)

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The episode of “According to Jim” in which Jim Belushi loses a hot dog eating contest to a petite Asian woman will be rerun tonight at 9:30 Eastern on ABC

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From CS & David Johansen

The following domains for AICE eaters were recently registered:
GentlemanJoeMenchetti.com
IanTheInvader.com
ChrisTheAmerican.com
MarkTheHumanVacuum.com
JoelTheCannon.com was listed in the email, but has not been registered.

The domains all link to existing web pages and were registered privately. Surprisingly, the Joe Menchetti domain links to cluckbucket.com and not speedeat. Ian Hickman’s domain links to his myspace page. Other myspace pages for AICE eaters:

Joshua Hearne
Chris Schlesinger
Vinny DiMeglio

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I will be teleblogging the broadcast of the Sheboygan Bratfest. It looks like the Hall of Fame induction ceremony will run long.

4:08 – the Reggie White induction is still going on, the whole broadcast will be shown on ESPN2 at 7

5:12 – the telecast has been completely pre-empted. I will try to watch the rerun on ESPN2 at 7.

7:03 – The broadcast opens with a history of the bratwurst festival. The weather report reads “You never sausage a nice day”

7:05 – Footage of Kobayashi working out is shown. Rich Shea predicts 2 eaters will break 50 brats. Sonya is interviewed and said her not being a favorite means less pressure for her.

7:09 – The announced attendance is 5,000. The ways to qualify are listed, which do not say the top 5 ranked get an automatic invitation. Footage of Tim Janus and Crazy Legs Conti at the qualifier is shown.

7:13 – The world’s largest grill is shown and the preparation method is explained.

7:19 – More bratfest history. A sausage making machine is shown. The first festival was held in 1953.

7:21 – Bratwurst techniques are explained. Chip Simpson is dispayed even though he did not qualify to my recollection.

7:24 – Profile of Joey Chestnut. He drinks a lot of water and has a “capacity run” at least once a week.

7:30 – The top 5 money winners are listed. Kobayashi’s earnings are listed at $100,000 even though I think he has not done any Japanese contest.

7:31 – El Toro, Conti, Bertoletti and Janus are briefly interviewed.

7:34 – Introductions, Thomas Denure (Georgetown, WI) , P J Kim (Princeton undergrad), Damon Serignet, Tim Brown (Chicago), Jim Hamrick, Frank Wach, El Toro Jiminez, Erik Denmark, Crazy Legs Conti (wearing a cheese necklace), Rich “the Locust” LeFevre, Tim Janus (carrying handlebars, claimed that Jennifer Annison gave him a gift basket because Vince Vaughn is an eating fan), Bob Shoudt, Pat Bertoletti (“You Talking to Meat” sign), Joey Chestnut, Takeru Kobayashi, Sonya Thomas (wearing the same orange shorts from Nathan’s).

7:45 – the contest starts – no running total (or even a clock) is displayed 🙁

7:47 – the running total is shown – Sonya is 5th , Kobayashi has a 1 – 2 lead over Joey

7:48 – quarter in Koby, Joey, Pat, Bob & Sonya is top 5

7:49 – 6 minutes left, Kobayashi’s lead is now 5/6 brats

7:50 – more helmetcam from P. J. Kim

7:51 – Kobayashi is at 36 at the halfway point

7:52 – Koby 41, Joey 34 with 4 minutes left

7:53 – Rich Shea claims Sonya has a mental block

7:54 – P.J. Kim is interviewed down 42 to 7

7:54 – 25% left Koby 47, Joey 38 Janus has passed Sonya for 5th

7:55 – Sonya is back in 5th, Koby’s lead reaches double digits

7:56 – Final results Koby 58, Joey 45 (who must “learn to love himself” to win Krystal), Pat 38

7:59 – a big check is passed to Kobayashi – he says he could eat more

8:00 – Joey is interviewed – he says he didn’t prepare for this contest like Nathan’s and says he will win Krystal.

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(from reuters) The shareholder advisory service ISS endorsed the Trian Group’s plan to install three members chosen by Trian to the Heinz board. Trian is run by Nelson Peltz, who wants Heinz to pay $200,000 to cosponsor Nathan’s famous hot dog eating contest. The Trian Group has put out a press release praising ISS’ endorsement. The Heinz board has set up an anti Trian website. Teresa Heinz Kerry will not have much say in the decision, as her family trust owns only about 4% of Heinz.

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Liz and Krista have a lunchtime interview with “Beautiful” Brian Seiken on truefan. If you want to know more about Brian other than the fact he is a former pickle champion with a website, hopefully your question will be answered there.

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As of 11:10 PM, sonyatheblackwidow.com appears to have vanished.

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A clip of Jenny Drumgoole’s documentary about Sonya Thomas at Wing Bowl 13 has been uploaded to youtube. If the documentary will not be released theatrically or direct to DVD, I hope all segments will be available on youtube like the “Chili Dawg” documentary.

(I do not have broadband this week, so I have not watched the documentary and am not sure if it is safe for work)

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Micah “Wing Kong” Collins has started a blog at http://conundrum54.blogspot.com/ Like Levi Oliver, Collins is a triathlete in addition to being a competitive eater.

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The Johnsonville Bratwurst contest from Sheboygan, WI will be televised on ESPN starting at 4 pm eastern (I think the contest itself will be tape delayed) The program will last an hour and it will be interesting to see what fills the remaining 50 minutes. The contest will be rerun twice on ESPN2.

From Yahoo TV

2006 Brat Eating World Championship
ESPN Aug 05 04:00pm
Special/Sports, 60 Mins.

* 2006 Brat Eating World Championship – Final, ESPN2 Aug 05 07:00pm
* 2006 Brat Eating World Championship – Final, ESPN2 Aug 06 02:00am

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Johnsonville bratwurst qualifier pix from Domenico Alesi

Bud Light Real Men of Genius radio ad – Mr. Hot Dog eating contest contestant & other eating contest links from Hall Hunt

Chris “the American” Schlesinger home page: http://chris-theamerican.bebo.com/ from Al

from Ken “the Demolisher” Wong
Ken Wong’s independent burger eating contest victory
Cloverdale BC, blueberry pie contest August 12
Modified IFOCE promo video on youtube

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Jason Fagone is the guest blogger for Powell’s Books of Portland and he has posted a segment about an imprisoned competitive eater that was excised from the published version of Horsemen of the Esophagus

Fagone has also posted his top nine cities in the world for competitive eating. Other cities/regions that a case could be made for include the Bay Area, CA (home of Joey Chestnut, Eddie “Bozo” Miller & original home of the LeFevres), Long Island (if considered separate from NYC), Amarillo, TX and Clearfield, PA.

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The New York Times has an article about “activist investor/corporate raider” Nelson Peltz’s clashes with the management of Heinz. Peltz wants to market more actively than the current board of directors does:

Mr. Peltz also wants Heinz to spend more on advertising to try to help increase the market for ketchup instead of paying money to retailers for shelf placement, which he says reduces the company’s margins. As an example of how Heinz might be more skilled with its marketing, he excitedly described how there was no sponsor besides Nathan’s for the World Championship Hot Dog Eating Contest and how Heinz missed out on a big opportunity.

“Where was the condiments sponsor?’’ he asked. “For $200,000 Heinz could have had their name all over the place, but that’s not their way.”

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The episode of Cheap Seats in which the Sklar brothers provide commentary on the 2004 Nathan’s hot dog eating contest will be rerun tonight at 11:30 pm and 2:30 am eastern (8:30 and 11:30 pm west coast)

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The Baltimore Sun has an article about last weekend’s episode of the NPR quiz show Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me which lists the questions and multiple choice answers for the competitive eating questions asked on that program. One of the answer choices should have been “a black bear and Nobuyuki “the Giant” Shirota”.

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(From Brian Seiken) The updated IFOCE rankings are available, with retired and inactive eaters removed from the list. Dale Boone has also been omitted, probably due his being suspended.

Top 10

1. Takeru Kobayashi
2. Joey Chestnut
3. Sonya Thomas
4. Patrick Bertoletti
5. Bob Shoudt
6. Timothy Janus
7. ChipBurger Simpson
8. Richard LeFevre
9. Eric Booker
10. Patrick Philbin

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Sports Illustrated NFL writer Peter King trashes Nathan’s hot dog eating contest in his blog-type column this week. The commenters on this Football Outsiders forum thread generally disagree with King’s opinion:

If Peter King really cares about the malnourished kids in Coney Island, he should be campaigning for the NFL to save the lavish free buffets for the press that have him at a solid 200+ and he can walk around the town giving out box lunches. Otherwise he should shut the **** up.

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The Sheboygan Times has an editorial on the Johnsonville bratwurst contest which is generally positive.

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