100 Quotes by Joey Chestnut

I'm more than just a competitive eater. I'm a smart guy. I could be an awesome park ranger.

I think Peter King... he's kind of narrow-minded.

I have to learn to ignore my feelings. Not just the feeling of hunger and the feeling of full, but the feeling of embarrassment, too. I have to remember that this is only weird if I make it weird.

If I'm going to get up on stage to eat hot dogs, I'm not going to do it to get third or fourth.

I love to eat internationally and do eating contests everywhere. Traveling around, meeting people, and doing different things.

I think the traveling is what drew me into 'The Amazing Race' years ago.

It wasn't like I grew up wanting to be a competitive eater at all. Not like a lot of people, like football players, famous people - they knew that that's what they wanted to do when they were young.

I was 21, and I was in college, and I'd eat real healthy during the week, and then on the weekends I would reward myself, and I'd just go to town on whatever my parents had in the fridge. And my little brother would be like, 'Hey.' And so it was actually him that begged me to do my first contest.

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.