Levi “The Prophet” Oliver has joined a running group to help train for his upcoming triathalon. One of his training partners wrote a blog entry about the experience of doing 200m sprints with Levi.

PermalinkComments (2)

Humble Bob Shoudt has started a myspace site at: http://www.myspace.com/humblebob

Other competitive eating myspace sites I am aware of:
Badlands Booker
Pat “from Moonachie” Philbin
Hungry Charles Hardy
Larry “The Legend” McNeil
Wing Bowl

Please inform me of any other competitive eating myspace sites.

PermalinkComments (4)

Erik “The Red” Denmark has started a blog at http://erikdenmark.blogspot.com/
which will document his quest to qualify for Nathan’s and become the best eater in the northwest. He has pictures from the chili cheese fries contest, the Laredo Jalapeno Festival and his attempt during Super Bowl 40 to join Sharon Scholten in the 40+ hot dogs in four hours club.

PermalinkComments (2)

This article in the Austin American Statesman describes how Levi Oliver is training for a triathlon in an effort to decrease his “belt of fat” and increase his chances of repeating as tamale eating champion.

PermalinkComments (1)

The Cincinatti City Beat has an article about Kevin Carr training by eating chili which resulted in his placing third in yesterday’s chocolate contest.

PermalinkComments (4)

Justin Mih established a claim to being at least an honorary member of “The New Kids on the Block” with two money-winning performances last October. The only competitors the UC-Irvine doctoral student lost to were Rich LeFevre and Jed Donahue. Mih is probably a better student than competitive eater, as he was selected as a Fulbright scholar to study space biology in Russia in 2003-04. With the IFOCE’s return to Southern California for the Queen Mary chili cheese fries contest, Mih will have a chance to validate his status as southern California’s second best eater behind Donahue if he competes in that event.

PermalinkComments

“Crazy Legs” Conti has an open letter to the competitive eating community on his website focusing on the main events in competitive eating in 2005.

PermalinkComments (2)

I have just discovered the blog written by Andrew “Skinnyboy” Lane (3rd place finisher at the Albuquerque golden.palace grilled cheese qualifier) which can be found at http://dogsarefunyes.blogspot.com/

PermalinkComments

Less than two weeks after their long profile of Sonya Thomas, the Washington Post has another lengthy article about competitive eating focusing on the anatomical aspects of competitive eaters. Don “Moses” Lerman, “Crazy Legs” Conti, Arnie “Chowhound” Chapman, and AICE rising star Ian Hickman are all quoted. Hickman moved to Sterling in northern Virginia to be closer to more eating contests which is interesting because the AICE schedule around the DC area does not seem full enough to justify a relocation.

Corrected 11/29 10:53 pm – Ian Hickman states in the comments his main reason for moving east was not to be closer to eating contests.

PermalinkComments (4)

The UPI has a short article on Chip Simpson, the physical therapy student from Slippery Rock University in western Pennsylvania who has made rapid ascent in competitive eating a this fall.

PermalinkComments (6)

Cincinnati Weekly has an interview with Columbus resident Kevin Carr, the 40th ranked IFOCE member. Carr will compete in the Knoxville Krystal qualifier.

PermalinkComments (18)

The East Valley (AZ) tribune has a profile of Mike Jones, who competed in the Phoenix grilled cheese qualifier and the Chandler baked bean contest.

PermalinkComments

The screen capture of the Sports Illustrated on Campus article about collegiate eaters uploaded previously is difficult to read, so I did another screen capture with larger text (and no picture) and uploaded it here.

The article mentions that Joey Chestnut found it difficult to do the Chattanooga Krystal qualifier after having competed the previous day, but does not state that the eater he lost to in that contest had done contests the preceding two days.

PermalinkComments

(Thanks Hall Hunt) The new issue of Sports Illustrated on Campus has a (generally positive) article about collegiate competitive eaters with short profiles of Joey Chestnut, Patrick Bertoletti and Hall Hunt. The print version is only available on college campuses, but an online (flash plug-in required) edition can be viewed at:

http://mag1.olivesoftware.com/activemagazine/welcome/SI/OnCampus.htm

The article can be found on page 28. (It takes a while to scroll through the magazine.)

Some interesting facts:

• Patrick Bertoletti is a culinary arts major
• Hall Hunt has ran a 3:34 marathon

2005 could be described as the the year of the rookie undergraduate eater due to the emergence of Chestnut and Bertoletti along with Kate Stelnick’s feat.

Update Oct 1 12:19 am A screen capture of the article has been uploaded.

PermalinkComments

The Salt Lake City Tribune has an article about the grilled cheese contest Sunday with some information about winner Ron Koch. None of the other competitors are named (2nd place finished with 11.5 sandwiches)

PermalinkComments

(From beautifulbrian.com) In a very generous gesture, Pat Philbin has placed the trophy he won at the Philadelphia Nathan’s qualifier along with his competitor’s pass for the Coney Island contest on ebay with 100% of the proceeds going to the Red Cross for Katrina relief. The current bid is $108.51 which is a doubling of the bid from two days ago. Bidding ends September 22.

PermalinkComments (2)