Takeru Kobayashi did a three part interview with Number Web. In Part 1, he discusses the origin of his competitive eating career in 2000 which was spurred by falling behind in his apartment rent as a college student.

“At that time, I was renting a room with my girlfriend, separate from the university dorm where I was living. However, neither of us were doing part-time work properly, so we ended up falling behind on our rent for about three months. We also lost our electricity and gas.

Electricity was still okay. If I could remember where things were before it got dark, I could get by. The rest was candlelight. And then, when the water was cut off, I realized this was bad…”

The prize for the winner was 500,000 yen. The 22-year-old Kobayashi headed to Hokkaido, where the event was held, to protect his life with his girlfriend.

In Part 2, Kobayashi talks about his rivalry with Nobuyuki Shirota and the heyday of Japanese competitive eating in 2001-2003 when the Food Battle Club contests awarded about $100,000 to the winner

Symbolizing this era is “Food Battle Club (FBC),” which began on TBS in 2001. The concept was to name competitive and speed-eating as “food battles” and determine the “strongest food fighter.” A total of four shows were broadcast in one year, including “The King of Masters,” which featured both competitive and speed-eating competitions, and “The Speed,” which specialized in speed-eating. The winner received an extraordinary prize of 10 million yen.

Until then, competitive eating and speed eating were considered entertainment, and participants were often classified as eccentrics or weirdos. Competitive eating was treated more like a one-off performance, like magic tricks. But Kobayashi was different. In order to eat more and faster than anyone else, he trained his body and honed his own unique technique. That was something that truly fell into the category of an athlete.

In Part 3, Kobayashi discusses rejecting two contracts: one from a Japanese television station and the Major League Eating offer in 2010 that he says would only have payed him about $40,000 annually

In 2010, Kobayashi moved to New York, but soon found himself cornered again. Nathan’s tried to pressure him into signing an exclusive contract.

The “exclusive contract for only 4 million yen” was also announced in the United States.

The contract stated that in exchange for a yearly salary of 4 million yen, he could not enter other tournaments without permission or get sponsors. Considering Kobayashi’s achievements, who had already gained fame in the United States, the amount was unreasonably low.

“I think they were probably wary that if I started to compete in the US in earnest, I would go to another tournament. At the time, MLE was my visa sponsor, so they told me that if I didn’t listen to them, I wouldn’t be able to compete in the US.”

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