11/05/24
July 03, 2002
Is speed eating a sport?: ESPN.com's Jim Caple investigates the growing trend in speed eating, and the declining size in the competitors. The IFOCE seems to think so. Do you?
How many does it take to form that federation? Count me in!
posted by trox at 03:22 PM on July 03, 2002
Thanks for posting this, as I was debating posting it myself after already posting this previously, which also was about speed eating, as I am still interested in seeing discussion of what constitutes sport vs. game or other. Anyway, you can see my response in that thread, which I still consider valid. Interestingly enough, Samsonov14 was the first to respond in both posts.
posted by joehyuk at 03:43 PM on July 03, 2002
I have to say that it is a sport in someway. It's challenging, you need to train to become successful, and doing so may reap grand awards. (Kobayashi made $150,000 in contests last year.) But in reference to your other post, you made a comment about baseball and the condition of its pitchers. I seem to recall that baseball is a 'national pastime'. A pastime isn't really a sport, is it?
posted by rebeuthl at 04:54 PM on July 03, 2002
The Food Network recently ran a 1-hour show about the IFOCE centering on the Nathan's hot dog eating contest (which is tommorrow, incidentally). It was brilliant for the fact that it took me a good solid half-hour to realize that the people weren't joking. Hopefully thet'll re-run it soon. It's one of the most unintentionally hilarious programs I've ever seen. Back on topic, I'll vote sport. They do have to train, there is competition, it's engrossing enough to some people that they travel the country on weekends to compete, and the most successful participants seem to be in excellent physical shape.
posted by ttrendel at 05:31 PM on July 03, 2002
joehyuk, now that I look back on your first post, it was kind of a dick move for me to just pull a Nancy Reagan on you. Part of the fun of Sportsfilter is talking about the fine line between "sports" and other "leisure activities" like videogames, competitive eating, and that thing where you try to catch the ball on a string in the little cup. I think competitive eating isn't a "sport" per se, but maybe I'm just jealous because I can only eat two hot dogs in one sitting. Eating contests seem more like something you do to get your name into the Guiness book. I don't consider flagpole sitting or jumping rope a sport either, but that doesn't mean the links shouldn't be posted here, and I'm sorry if it came across that way in the first eating post. And to address the reason why I commented first on both posts: My job is very, very unfulfilling. Oh and Trox, you can be co-captain of the American Team. Let's just hope our first match isn't against the Australians.
posted by Samsonov14 at 05:49 PM on July 03, 2002
No problem Samsonov 14, although I appreciate your fleshing out your response. Good point on the flagpole sitting and especially jumping rope. No one would consider jumping rope a sport (yet) but in many ways, it is very similar to an eating contest. However, I think the main difference to me is that when you are jumping rope, you only compete against a record, while in an eating contest (as in practically all other sport) you compete against others.
posted by joehyuk at 11:38 AM on July 05, 2002
My bad. I'm glad you thought to check the page source. For the record, what I meant to say follows: joehyuk, now that I look back on your first post, it was kind of a dick move for me to just pull a Nancy Reagan on you. Part of the fun of Sportsfilter is talking about the fine line between "sports" and other "leisure activities" like videogames, competitive eating, and that thing where you try to catch the ball on a string in the little cup. I think competitive eating isn't a sport per se, but maybe I'm just jealous because I can only eat two hot dogs in one sitting. Eating contests seem more like something you do to get your name into the Guiness book. I don't consider flagpole sitting or jumping rope a sport either, but that doesn't mean the links shouldn't be posted here, and I'm sorry if it came across that way in the first eating post. And to address the reason why I commented first on both posts: My job is very, very unfulfilling. Oh and Trox, you can be co-captain of the American Team. Let's just hope our first match isn't against the Australians.
posted by Samsonov14 at 12:09 PM on July 05, 2002
Your search - "international federation of competitive drinking" - did not match any documents.