The 9st king of the eating Olympics

Last updated at 11:55 06 July 2004


There must be just one question most people ask world hot dog eating champion Takeru Kobayashi when they meet him for the first time - just where do you put it all?

At just 5ft 7in and weighing little more than 9st, the 26-year-old looks as if one snack would be more than enough to fill him up.

But he has just downed 53.5 of the snacks in 12min to retain his official world crown for the fourth year in a row.

Known in the competitive eating world as The Tsunami, he earned his title by winning Nathan's Famous Fourth of July International Hot Dog Eating Contest in New York, a competition which started in 1916.

One dog every 15 seconds

He downed one dog every 15 sec to break his own record, set in 2002, by three and again take the coveted mustard yellow belt back to Nagano. His nearest rival of 19 contestants, Nobuyuki Shirota, 25, of Tokyo, couldn't cut the mustard with 38 dogs.

Mr Kobayashi, who also holds world records for eating cow brains, was typically modest when picking up his award from mayor Michael Bloomberg.

The champion puts his success down to his trademark "Solomon approach". That involves him breaking his sausages and buns in half before shoving them in his mouth. "It saves me half the chewing effort," he said.

He also says he goes in for proper training. "It's like any other sport. You really have to be dedicated.

"You have to gradually build up your gut by eating larger and larger amounts of food and then be sure to work it all off so body fat doesn't put a squeeze on the expansion of your stomach in competition," he explained.

Competitive eating has its own governing body, New York's International Federation of Competitive Eating, and branches around the world.

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