Joey Chestnut Eats 32 Big Macs in 38 Minutes, Breaking World Record: 'I Have an Amazing Tolerance'
Joey Chestnut already set a world record and downed 74 hot dogs in 10 minutes at the 2018 Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest, but now he’s gone to the next level by crushing 32 McDonald’s Big Macs in one sitting.
The competitive eater has won the annual hot dog contest in Coney Island, New York, 12 times in the last 13 years, and he is currently ranked first in the world by Major League Eating. Recently, Chestnut swapped hot dogs for the iconic McDonald’s burger. Prior to his performance, the record was set at 30.
He posted an entertaining though very displeasing 12-minute-long video of his feat on YouTube yesterday, though the 32 double-patty hamburger meal took him just over 38 minutes to consume. And no, he doesn’t wet the buns throughout like he does during the hot dog challenge. He simply shakes out some of the lettuce and proceeds in quite a normal fashion.
Diether Endlicher/AP
Throughout the video, Chestnut pauses in between burgers and speaks to the camera while wearing a “FUN ON THE BUN!” t-shirt. By minute five and burger seven, he’s already got the meat sweats, but he keeps pushing through. “I’m sweating a little bit…that’s normal.”
16 minutes into the challenge, however, he does begin to slow down. “My throat’s getting a little bit tired. But as far as flavor fatigue…they’re Big Macs,” he exclaims. “I don’t get tired of Big Macs themselves!”
In a voiceover, Chestnut reminisces on his childhood, throughout which he would eat three Big Macs with his grandfather on a regular basis. He elaborated in a heartwarming caption: “Since being a kid, I’ve dreamt about eating as many Big Macs as I could…I think about all the times I was there with my grandpa and it’s weird the way that food takes you back and helps you remember things. With Big Macs, I definitely remember my grandpa.”
By minute 25, Chestnut is consuming nearly 1 BPM (burger per minute) and running out of steam quickly. “Usually I only eat for like ten minutes,” he points out. “This is a hell of a cheat day. I’m gonna pass out, baby!”
But nevertheless, he persisted. Chestnut easily surpassed the world record in 34 minutes, and miraculously kept going. “I know that I’m gonna get it done, but my body is just slowing down…It’s like the last couple miles of a marathon,” he says before clarifying that he’s never actually run a marathon and doesn’t plan on doing so.
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In the end, Chestnut achieves his goal of destroying 32 Big Macs — including the lettuce — in a measly 38 minutes and 15 seconds. That’s 18,016 calories and 15.36 lbs of burger, in case anyone’s wondering.
“If you have any ideas [for videos] in the future, let me know,” Chestnut says at the end of his race. “Anything fun…not too easy. I like pushing myself, I like eating. And I like going into a food coma afterward.”
