The contest was delayed by storms. Its fate hung in the balance for over an hour, with reports circulating that it might even be canceled, as contestants waited to see if the weather would allow them to eat. Yet by mid-afternoon, a window of opportunity had arrived, and they seized it. The result was the same one everybody had been expecting.
Joey Chestnut ate 62 hot dogs and buns in 10 minutes to secure his eighth consecutive title at Nathan’s Famous International Hot Dog Eating Contest at Coney Island.
It is Chestnut’s 16th title overall. And while 62 doesn’t come close to his world record of 76—humidity can affect the buns enough to make that kind of elite performance difficult—there was still no question about his dominance.
No one else ate more than 50 hot dogs and buns. Geoff Esper came in second with 49; James Webb finished third with 47. This is how much Chestnut owns the Fourth of July. He can finish significantly off his record, and still, no one will even come close.
So: What’s it like to eat next to someone that good?
IMAGO
“I remember, when I first started eating, I think I was on my fifth or 10th hot dog, and Joey was already on like his 20th or 30th” says Esper, whose first July Fourth contest was in 2015. “It was like, Oh, my God, how the heck is he doing that?”
Esper has worked hard to hone his skills in the eight years since. He’s now the No. 2 eater in the world and has beaten Chestnut in several foods, including ribs, pizza and chicken wings. But—of course—not the big one. He’s never come too close with hot dogs. He knows he very well never might. And much as he savors his victories in other foods, well, he doesn’t think they taste quite as good as the one he’s still missing.
“At those other contests, if you beat him, it’s not like you’re beating Joey when he’s at Coney,” Esper says.
Chestnut’s competitive fire is legendary on the eating circuit. He’s friendly with many of his competitors away from the table; no one has a bad word to say about him. But when they sit down to eat? Chestnut is all business.
“He's got an inner hubris that clearly stokes the fires of his belly,” says Crazy Legs Conti, a veteran eater who has been competing for almost two decades and finished in 15th place this year with 15 hot dogs and buns. “But it's not far blown cockiness. It's really—I think he's very grateful. So it's rare to see that sort of humility and hubris existing in the same person.”
Yet that humility disappears when the clock starts at Coney Island.
“You can tell when he's on,” Esper says. “Like, he's really intense and he's practicing, he knows what to do and he's focused. That's going to be a rough battle.”
Still: Everyone at the table is trying to beat him. How could they not? They know it’s a long (long) (long) shot. But it’s possible for Chestnut to lose at Coney Island—it’s happened before, after all, if not in years—and they’re all here to compete. Like eater Nick Wehry, who came in fourth this year, with 45 hot dogs and buns.
“My goal in any contest is to win,” Wehry says. “I’m not disillusioned to think it’s going to be a piece of cake. I respect what Joey has done… But the fact of the matter is, he’s a man who puts his pants on one leg at a time, I assume. He started somewhere with hot dogs, and he built his way up to 76, which is incredible. But he didn’t do that through magic or voodoo. He did it through incredible amounts of hard work, drive and determination, probably a psychotic obsession for perfection… So that mountain seems virtually insurmountable. But now, I want to climb it even more, because you told me I can’t.”
Lately? No one’s come close to climbing that mountain. But Chestnut doesn’t need competition to motivate him. He motivates himself. And even without a new record—fair enough, given the weather conditions—he still felt satisfied with his work.
“I’m just happy,” Chestnut told the broadcast after his victory. “It’s the Fourth of July. I got to eat some hot dogs and get a win.”
