Would you eat nine pounds of turkey in 10 minutes for $5,000? Joey Chestnut did, and it was 9.35 pounds of turkey to be exact.
Imagine that: putting on over nine pounds in just 10 minutes. Dude must have one of those "force-flex" bags for a stomach. Most people would rather lose that much weight — and it would take them way longer than 10 minutes to do it.
(Upon hearing this news, we imagine you're probably either cheering at the magnitude of the feat accomplished by this well-known professional competitive eater... Or trying not to vomit.)
It went down at the Foxwoods World Turkey-Eating Championship on Saturday, November 22, 2014, which was overseen by Major League Eating. (Yes, that's a thing.) Chestnut, a longtime champion in the world of competitive eating, shattered the previous record of 5.25 pounds in 10 minutes. Afterward, he told the New York Daily News how he did it.
Each participant was given a fully-cooked 20 pound turkey and — and get this — no knives or utensils. (So not only are they expected to gorge themselves on a dangerously fast binge, they can't even pretend to be civilized about it.) Chestnut's strategy was to dig down to the bottom meat, eating it first, then he went after the turkey breast, and then "just drank and drank and swallowed."
Almost 10 pounds heavier than he was just 10 minutes ago, Chestnut took home the $5,000 check and sent out a humorous tweet about his exhaustion.
I waddled away with the win today, 9.35 pounds of turkey in ten minutes @FoxwoodsCT a nap sounds amazing!!
— Joey Chestnut (@joeyjaws) November 22, 2014
