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Pretty much all I'm doing during an eating contest is being uncomfortable and not forgetting to breathe.
Joey Chestnut
It was hard for me to take competitive eating serious at first. When I made people happy, I became addicted to that. It's been a fun, fun ride.
If I'm going to get up on stage to eat hot dogs, I'm not going to do it to get third or fourth.
My birthday is always around Thanksgiving, and I always had to have turkey on my birthday. My mom was always, 'Let's celebrate your birthday on Thanksgiving.' My other siblings got to have special dinners they liked. I resented turkey. For a long time, I hated turkey. I've kind of gotten over it.
I don't mind losing because it really shows me what the other eaters are capable of.
I don't want to train for every contest the way I do for the Fourth of July. It would be impossible.
I love food, and not surprisingly, I often suffer from stomach upsets when I overeat in general, let alone when I'm competing.
I'd never eaten lobster before. I was 21. I didn't know what the heck I was doing. I was scooping guts. But I tied for third. And the two men who beat me didn't look good. One was Bob Shoudt. He seemed in pain. And I felt fine! I was 'Oh, my God, they look like they're dying. And I can eat so much more!' I knew I was made for it after that contest.
I know I hold the contest record for downing the most hot dogs, and the record for most Nathan's Famous Hot Dog Contest championships, but it was really cool to be a part of a Guinness World Records official attempt.
I can't always go out to a restaurant and have a normal dinner.
There have always been a lot of critics of competitive eating. You can be a critic of anything. It's easy to be a critic. You can say negative things about golf, the amount of water wasted on golf courses. Or NASCAR. There are wastes in everything.
I'm lucky. My parents are, like, super hippies. They were just happy I was going to school and I wasn't getting in trouble.
So now I'm 'the hot dog guy', which isn't bad. I take it in stride. It's not like it was my goal in life. I'm having fun with it.
If I can train for a contest for a week, it's a guaranteed victory.
That's one reason I like hot dogs. Nice and clean. And you can count them as they're going down.
It was a hard decision to give up a normal job. I worked hard to get through school. You go from building a fire station to an eating contest.
There have been times when things get stuck in my throat, but you just work it up or down. Like how a swimmer probably can't imagine drowning - their bodies are so used to being in the water. I'm so used to shoving things down my throat.
Military caregivers play an essential role in the recovery process of our veterans and are more than deserving of our support.
When I'm in training, I eat no solid food except hot dogs for six weeks.
I think my body was built to eat 68 hot dogs. It's natural.
I think Peter King... he's kind of narrow-minded.
There's nothing worse than getting third.
If there's something I like, I'm going to eat a little more of it than most people.
I've strained some muscles here and there, in my throat, even my jaw. Nothing that doesn't heal quickly.
I do know when my body is ready or when it's going to perform best for me.
I think food brings people together, and it makes people happy.
Competitive eating is something I can control. I know I can control, and if I push hard, I can win.
Everything at a baseball game is pretty much health food if you subscribe to the theory that you're eating what makes you happy.
Once I get a rhythm going, I can jump those hot dogs down.
Winning tastes pretty good.
I've slowly made my body adapt and understand what's going to happen.
I have the greatest job in the world, and my life revolves around my love for food - particularly devouring hot dogs.
I remember as a kid watching that movie - 'Cool Hand Luke' - with my grandfather.
It doesn't get old. Just like running doesn't get old to people who like to run. I just love to eat.
There's no better feeling than beating someone who's up on a high horse.
I've signed babies' arms. I wanted to pull a 'Ricky Bobby' and sign a baby's forehead.
Honestly, I'm so competitive that sometimes I don't understand what other people are going through.
I think I get out of bed because I love to eat.
I'm getting older, and I'm smarter about how I eat.
I didn't just eat hot dogs. I studied how the food went into your system and how it would be digested.
I'm getting paid to eat. It's not too bad of a life.
It wasn't like I grew up wanting to be a competitive eater at all. Not like a lot of people, like football players, famous people - they knew that that's what they wanted to do when they were young.
It's pretty rare for me to be someplace that serves hot dogs and not eat one.
I've learned how to gnarl the food down. It's not pretty.
I can't tell you all my secrets to how I can eat so many. Someone out there might copy it. But I will tell you this: The night before the competition, I sleep only four hours. That means when I actually do eat, my stomach will want to digest the food quicker.
It's more of a mental sport because I know I can push harder than someone who doesn't know what his body can do.
When I'm eating I try to make sure I can breathe through my nose the entire time. If I have to breathe through my mouth, there's no way I'm eating or swallowing.
I love king crab a lot. I love good Mexican food, good tacos, and chile rellenos.
I have to learn to ignore my feelings. Not just the feeling of hunger and the feeling of full, but the feeling of embarrassment, too. I have to remember that this is only weird if I make it weird.
It's addicting, beating the heck out of people and eating hot dogs and making people smile. I do feel like garbage afterwards, but so what? Most people feel like garbage after a long day of work.
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