Jul 4

Ex-Hot Dog Eating Champ Takeru Kobayashi arrested in New York on Independence Day

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By JQ Magazine’s Justin Tedaldi (CIR Kobe-shi, 2001-02) for Examiner.com. Visit his NY Japanese Culture page here to subscribe for free alerts on newly published stories.

Say what you will about former hot dog eating champ Takeru Kobayashi, he’s no chicken.

The six-time winner of the Nathan’s Famous Fourth of July International Hot Dog Eating Contest was busted at the 95th edition of the annual event Sunday after attempting to storm the stage following the fourth win in a row by his American archrival Joey Chestnut. In an AP video, the Japan-born Kobayashi, clad in a “Free Kobi” T-shirt, is dragged away and handcuffed by multiple NYPD officers to the shouts in the crowd of “U.S.A.! U.S.A.!” while his interpreter Maggie James, wearing the same T-shirt, says frantically, “They weren’t giving him his freedom. It was unfair.”

As reported yesterday, Kobayashi officially blogged his intent to drop out of the competition after reaching an impasse over an exclusivity contract with Major League Eating, the sanctioning body of the Nathan’s event and other food-related contests. Public opinion Kobayashi, nicknamed “The Tsunami,” was divided between his announcement and the event, with some dubbing him a sore loser and coward (he had previously groused over an arthritic jaw before losing to Chestnut for the first time in 2007), and others applauding his decision to remain a free agent.

Read the full article here.