Don Lerman set a record by eating seven sticks of salted butter in five minutes. In six years, competitive eating, he was 100 pounds.
Dominick Cardo, known as "The Doginator" contests, woke up last night sweating and feeling nauseated stomach and chest pain.
Both former competitve eaters competed in the Nathan's Famous July Fourth International Hot Dog Eating Contest. This year's competition Airs Saturday on ESPN.
"How you look at it, it is not healthy," Dave "Coondog" O'Karma, a retired competitive eater, said in his former hobby. "You do it once in a while, and fun. I can not load your body with fat and salt is healthy."
After 35 years of gobbling hamburger, oysters, eggs, corn on the Cob, and even bull testicles, O'Karma listened to his family and retired from competition.
Despite having joined the health reasons, ex-speed eaters fondly remember the thrill of competing, cramming food down their throats and Basking in cheers.
"I'm probably a hypocrite," said O'Karma, as head of the Association of Independent competitive eaters. "There is a sixth class in me that loves a good hot dog the contest."
The toll of competitive eating on the body has not been studied, and it seems unlikely that such an investigation would take place, since it is a small, specialized populations.
In 2007, four University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine physicians specializing in gastroenterology and Radiology conducted a trial on the abdomen of a competitive eater and an average eater.
The average eater ate seven hot dogs before he felt ill. Champion speed eater Tim Janus ate 36 hot dogs in 10 minutes before doctors intervened.
Janus, a trim 29-year-old at the time insisted that he did not feel full. Through training and competing, he no longer felt completely independent of how much he ate. Magee had muscle contraction called peristalsis, moving food down the digestive tract.
Instead of hot dogs Saturday in the stomach and protruded enough to create different views of a developing intrauterine pregnancy, "the doctors wrote.
A committee is not decisive, lead author Marc S. Levine said. He speculated that over time, your stomach can lose its ability to deflate which may cause nausea and vomiting.
Lack of stomach activity, such as Janus ", is seen in extreme cases where people suffer from bowel obstructions," says Levine, professor and head of Gastrointestinal Radiology, University of Pennsylvania Medical Center.
Abdominal stop contracting companies and swell when there is scarring, wounds or disease tumor creates hurdles.
"Patients who have terrible gastroparesis - it is when your stomach does not contract - the patients who often have diabetes or are on high doses of drugs over a long time," Levine said.
Janus told doctors that his stomach would deflate several days of competition. During that time he did not eat.
In an opinion piece published in the American Journal of Radiology, the doctors warned of a possible "morbid obesity, profound gastroparesis, intractable nausea and vomiting, and even the need for gastrectomy. In spite of its increasing popularity, competitive speed eating is a potentially self-destructive form of behavior. "
During 35 years competitive eating, O'Karma considered medical advice.
"When I was having fun, I do not care," he said. "It was worth discomfort to get what I wanted. It was fun - and not eat so much, but to travel, see all sorts of places and different people. I am a house painter in reality. How can I get a chance like it? For an average guy, I took such a long way with something stupid. "
Despite health warnings about obesity, the faces of competitive eating is not overweight.
Takeru Kobayashi of Nagano, Japan, is a slender man who locked hot dogs in half and babble BITS robotically. For years, Kobayashi and world record holder Joey Chestnut of San Jose, California, have vied for top prize in the annual hot dog contest at Coney Island, New York.
"The new generation of eaters are interested in weight lifting, running," said Jason Fagone delivered competitive eaters for years for his book, "Horseman of the esophagus." They have more athletic body types than the old generation. "
The younger, fitter speed eaters justify health risks for businesses like them to run a marathon. Their reasoning: Activities such as soccer and running is stressful on the body, but a random game, marathon, or speed-increasing eating the contest will be ok, Fagone said.
Damage can occur, for example, vomiting, abdominal pain and suffocation. In October, newspapers in Taiwan reported that a 23-year-old student choked to death in a steamed-dumpling-eating competition. Cost was $ 60
Some long-term competitive eaters have developed diabetes and acid reflux disease, Fagone said. Some take medication for the treatment of symptoms of gastro esophageal Reflux Disease.
"It tends to attract an intense kind of person, the person is willing to overlook the best health advice," he said.
Lerman retired from competitive eating, because he could not keep pace with the younger eaters. Since retiring three years ago, the 66-year-old tries to throw the extra 100 pounds he received, which he attributes partly foot injury which kept him inactive.
In his prime, he wolfed down 120 jalapeño Peppers and six pounds of baked beans and loved each bid and his time in the limelight.
"When you up on stage and they announce your name and you get the picture with Mayor Giuliani or Mayor Bloomberg, that it is high. It makes you feel so good inside," he said. Down in the intestine, the Levittown, New York, resident said: "You are really inflated.
Former contestant Cardo knew that his love of eating was not healthy. But he continued to train and ate 3 pounds of beef tongue in a contest. As he ballooned to 400 pounds, he knew that he did not get better by eating contests. He often felt tired and out of breath.
"During the competitions, you come to a point, you can not go any further," Cardo said. "I did not want to continue to abuse my body."
He had an inflammatory disease called sarcoidosis. His arteries were halfway close, triggering chest pain. Stomach ached, and his doctor warned him to stop. Cardo finally listened and retired in 2006. After a gastric bypass surgery, Cardo is half its former size of 205 pounds.
To fill the need to compete, he bowls and play poker instead.
Cardo's plans to create the hot dog eating contest on TV.
"I must look at the competition on Saturday, because I used to do it and I liked it," he said. "Between it and live longer and healthier life, I would rather do what I do now."
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