I was awful my first time. I was so shy eating in front of people. It was so awkward. But my next contest, I brought a bunch of my family out, and I won that one. I remember I almost barfed because my mom, at the end of the contest, she yelled out, 'Do it for Mama!' Everybody laughed. It was one of the closest I've ever been to barfing.
There's a couple of foods that if you see me eat them in a contest, you can tell I like them. Grilled cheese sandwiches, chicken wings, ribs, hot dogs, hamburgers, pizza. I mean, those, they go down like I was made to eat them.
That's one reason I like hot dogs. Nice and clean. And you can count them as they're going down.
The crowd loves a record, and if they're gonna be standing out there in crazy, blistering heat on the 4th of July, I mean, if they're doing it, I may as well try and give them a record.
There's no better feeling than knowing I'm going to break the guy next to me. His body will shut down, and I will keep eating. Then I will look out and see a crowd of happy people.
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.
Once I get a rhythm going, I can jump those hot dogs down.
I was able to get a civil engineering degree and travel around the world and eat.
They don't sell the Nathan's hot dogs hardly anywhere in the West Coast. So I have to special order them, and I just end up getting Nathan's to ship them to me.
I don't really get hungry that much. Sometimes I get cravings for certain foods. But I can go all day without eating.
Mom only gets angry when I don't visit her enough. She raised six kids to be 100 percent independent and work for everything we achieve. I mean, we don't expect anything for free.
Maybe in America there's more of an emphasis on food than there should be. But when I look out at the audience during a competition, some people are shocked, but most people are smiling.
There's nothing pretty about competitive eating. It might be uncouth, but it is fun, and it is lighthearted.
There's no better feeling than beating someone who's up on a high horse.
There are times when I'm not eating buns if I'm on a low carb diet. I'll have hot dogs and romaine lettuce, but if I'm at a baseball game, I'm always eating a hot dog.
I'd like to go out on top, preferably breaking a new world record on the Fourth of July.
I can't always go out to a restaurant and have a normal dinner.
I lose now and then. I get lazy. And sometimes I work just hard enough to win.
The bigger the crowd, the more likely I'll do whatever it takes to win.
I'm really normal except for the competitive eating.
