July 23, 2025 • 8 mins
The #4 ranked competitive eater in the world joins us to talk new documentary, Joey Chestnut and more!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're on with Mario a little.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Bit tebro Marriol Lopez joining me right now in Zoom,
Australia's top ranked competitive eater, number four ranked in the
entire world.
Speaker 3 (00:10):
Mister James Webb, how are you, James?
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Good? Thanks?
Speaker 3 (00:13):
How are you do? I'm well, nice to speak with you.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
I always I'm always fascinated with competitive eaters and how
thin they are. Like, you're a thin individual. You know,
one would think you get into competitive eating you'd be
a chubby guy or a big, big guy. But that
is not the case. How does a person get into
competitive eating? And when did you know you had the skill?
Speaker 3 (00:38):
Well, firstly, I appreciate that.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Thank you. Tell us my wife she married a bodyboita.
Now she's got this, so I appreciate. I guess Look,
how I started in competitive eating was a little bit
of a joke. Actually, I went for lunch with my
with my girlfriend who's now my wife. Obviously, we went
to a pub in a rural kind of little little
(01:01):
town on the way to a very famous wine tour,
and my wife bribed me with like a food eating
day out. Anyway, get to this pub. They have a
food challenge and the owner of the pub in this
little country town. I think he had a couple of
beers with lunch, and he was a bit a little
bit tipsy, and he was like running his mouth a
little bit about this undefeated food challenge and it's so
(01:23):
big and this and that. I'm like, I'll try it,
like whatever, you know, anyway, I hate this bigger in
like twenty three minutes, and it was it was ten pounds,
so it was pretty big. But I never realized what
competitive eating was.
Speaker 3 (01:38):
Until that day.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
And then like I started getting messages from people saying, hey, man,
like competitive eating, like you're.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
So good at this.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
I'm like, what the hell is this?
Speaker 1 (01:46):
Like what have I done? And oh yeah, it kind
of changed my life.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
So wasn't anything you necessarily trained for or it's not
a particular skill set.
Speaker 3 (01:56):
You just either have a big appetit or you don't, Right.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Yeah, I think so. And I think as well, like
I love food like I love to eat, like saying
I love to eat like I was a fat kid growing.
Speaker 4 (02:07):
Up, so you know, I never realized.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
I never actually sat at the table and realized, hey,
I'm eating this much and you're eating this much. I
kind of just ate, you know what, I mean so
competitive eating when you look at it, Yeah, Like I'm
a big eater. I've got a big appetite. And the
other side of it is it's like a sport, right
Like you can train, Like if you're a football player,
you train to be a better football player. You go
(02:30):
to the gym to lift more weights, to get bigger muscles,
et cetera. Yeah, I literally I train, I eat more food,
to eat more food.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
So I'm fascinated by this because I'm a pretty big
eater myself. I always say pound for pound, I'm not
a pro or anything, but pound for pound I think
I can pretty much. And I've had large individuals also
tell me, you eat more than anybody I've ever seen.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
And not by design. I just I just happened to
eat a lot.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Now, is there is when you I guess I'm trying
to say, when you know you have a competition and
do you starve yourself? Is that how it works or
what's the.
Speaker 3 (03:04):
Approach to it?
Speaker 4 (03:05):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
It's a bit about your stomach and now you're at
it and now it's a disadvantage.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
So it's a bit of a balancing act. We all
kind of have our own technique in style, but basically,
like let's say, for example, let's say the contest is
a Saturday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. You're stretching your stomach, eating
like a maniac, you know, trying to get your stomach
as stretched as you can. Thursday will be a lot
of fluid, Friday will be a lot of fluid, no eating,
(03:35):
and you kind of go from being full as humanly
possible to as empty as humanly possible.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
That's the best way to describe it.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
So then on contest to day, you have as much
real estate inside your body, yes, but as much like
you know, capacity as possible.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
Yeah, wow, that you know, you you painted that picture
rather well. And I know you just placed third in
the annual Nathan's Hot Dog eating contest on the fourth
of July's that's a big time yet forty five and
a half dogs in ten minutes.
Speaker 3 (04:06):
That is absolutely incredible.
Speaker 2 (04:09):
And I know Joey Chustnet ended up winning that, but
you've actually beaten Joey in some other eating competitions, right.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
Yeah, Look, obviously Joey's the goat. He's been doing this
twenty two years now. I'm into my fourth year so
I'm trying to try to make up, you know, make
up time with the base. But yeah, actually, like Joey
is the undisputed He's the hot dog chap Man, Like,
I don't know how he does it, but I've actually
beaten him. I've been a few of his world records,
but I've beaten him head to head in the last
three chicken wing contests. The chicken wing so I'm actually
(04:40):
your chicken, like like hot dogs are Joey's thing. Yeah,
And don't get me wrong, Joey has a lot of
really strong suits, right, but yeah, I'm actually for some reason,
I'm really good at chicken wings. And I've beaten him
three times in a row.
Speaker 3 (04:53):
Are these bones with chicken wings or with bones?
Speaker 1 (04:57):
No? No bones? So it's all about to pick, right,
stripping the meat off the bone and the techniquing it.
And because they weigh your bowl, right, so basically you
get a twenty pound bowl of wings, and like if
you only bite out of the wing and chuck it
back in the bowl, like you can do that. Yeah,
but at the end of the day, like they're going
to weigh your bowl. So the more meat you eat,
you know, sorry, didn't mean to right there. But the
(05:19):
more meat that gets eat it, the more chance you
have a winning right. So I have a really good
technique of like stripping the meat off the bone and
you know, eating more meat than anybody else and me
a lot of time.
Speaker 3 (05:29):
Dang, that is wild. This is so fascinating.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
And You've actually got a documentary coming to Amazon Prime
on August twenty second called James Can Eat properly titled
and in the trailer it shows you spent a long
time in the hospital.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Was that from competitive eating?
Speaker 1 (05:46):
No, definitely not. So. I've got a very rare autoimmune disease.
It's called gin Barre syndrome. It's super rare. Not many
people have it. Me obviously being from Australia, it was
like not unheard of, but it was a rare feeding
it took them frames to actually properly diagnose me. I
ended up spending almost two years in the hospital with
(06:07):
that kind of trying to get that, I guess under control.
There's no cure for that autoimmune disease, so I just
kind of live with it. But I'm definitely through the worst,
bed and up and everything in season right.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
Good, good to hear man, that's good.
Speaker 4 (06:24):
To hear.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
Now, I want to get personal for a second. When
you eat this incredible amount of food, what's the restroom situation?
Speaker 3 (06:33):
Like, is it is? Are you just parked in there
for a second? Does your wife just clear the house?
Like I gotta imagine that's not a pretty thing. We
have separate butlers.
Speaker 5 (06:44):
Always the amounts of food I sometimes eat, I leave
home without baby wipes, I need about, you know, twenty
or thirty minutes quiet time sometimes because it does get.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Well, twenty thirty minutes is what I averages that she.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Has her own bathroom.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
For good research, she's got her own bathroom. No, but
I mean twenty to thirty minutes is my average. So
that's just from that.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
That's yeah, but it's kind of like, yeah, so you
go from like hot flushes to cold flushes, and then
you get like paying for a little bit.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
So you kind of sit there and like, you know,
reevaluate your life choices and then you kind of back
at it and you get these intense Tommy cramch Oh,
my contest can be rough, like don't get you know,
like the contest up the market can be a.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
Lot, so like you kind of just deal with it
and yeah, yeah, it is what it is.
Speaker 3 (07:36):
It's basically Mario's Thursday. Yeah yeah, damn that is.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
That is impressive and I'm looking forward to checking out
the documentary.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
James.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
Good luck with everything and everyone, please be sure to
check out the new documentary James Can Eat, which is
coming to Amazon Prime August twenty second.
Speaker 3 (07:53):
Thanks for checking in, man, Thank you guys so much
for having me. I really appreciate it. You got a buddy,
take care of low.
Speaker 4 (08:00):
Mario Lopez
You're on with Mario a little.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Bit tebro Marriol Lopez joining me right now in Zoom,
Australia's top ranked competitive eater, number four ranked in the
entire world.
Speaker 3 (00:10):
Mister James Webb, how are you, James?
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Good? Thanks?
Speaker 3 (00:13):
How are you do? I'm well, nice to speak with you.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
I always I'm always fascinated with competitive eaters and how
thin they are. Like, you're a thin individual. You know,
one would think you get into competitive eating you'd be
a chubby guy or a big, big guy. But that
is not the case. How does a person get into
competitive eating? And when did you know you had the skill?
Speaker 3 (00:38):
Well, firstly, I appreciate that.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Thank you. Tell us my wife she married a bodyboita.
Now she's got this, so I appreciate. I guess Look,
how I started in competitive eating was a little bit
of a joke. Actually, I went for lunch with my
with my girlfriend who's now my wife. Obviously, we went
to a pub in a rural kind of little little
(01:01):
town on the way to a very famous wine tour,
and my wife bribed me with like a food eating
day out. Anyway, get to this pub. They have a
food challenge and the owner of the pub in this
little country town. I think he had a couple of
beers with lunch, and he was a bit a little
bit tipsy, and he was like running his mouth a
little bit about this undefeated food challenge and it's so
(01:23):
big and this and that. I'm like, I'll try it,
like whatever, you know, anyway, I hate this bigger in
like twenty three minutes, and it was it was ten pounds,
so it was pretty big. But I never realized what
competitive eating was.
Speaker 3 (01:38):
Until that day.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
And then like I started getting messages from people saying, hey, man,
like competitive eating, like you're.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
So good at this.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
I'm like, what the hell is this?
Speaker 1 (01:46):
Like what have I done? And oh yeah, it kind
of changed my life.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
So wasn't anything you necessarily trained for or it's not
a particular skill set.
Speaker 3 (01:56):
You just either have a big appetit or you don't, Right.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Yeah, I think so. And I think as well, like
I love food like I love to eat, like saying
I love to eat like I was a fat kid growing.
Speaker 4 (02:07):
Up, so you know, I never realized.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
I never actually sat at the table and realized, hey,
I'm eating this much and you're eating this much. I
kind of just ate, you know what, I mean so
competitive eating when you look at it, Yeah, Like I'm
a big eater. I've got a big appetite. And the
other side of it is it's like a sport, right
Like you can train, Like if you're a football player,
you train to be a better football player. You go
(02:30):
to the gym to lift more weights, to get bigger muscles,
et cetera. Yeah, I literally I train, I eat more food,
to eat more food.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
So I'm fascinated by this because I'm a pretty big
eater myself. I always say pound for pound, I'm not
a pro or anything, but pound for pound I think
I can pretty much. And I've had large individuals also
tell me, you eat more than anybody I've ever seen.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
And not by design. I just I just happened to
eat a lot.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Now, is there is when you I guess I'm trying
to say, when you know you have a competition and
do you starve yourself? Is that how it works or
what's the.
Speaker 3 (03:04):
Approach to it?
Speaker 4 (03:05):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
It's a bit about your stomach and now you're at
it and now it's a disadvantage.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
So it's a bit of a balancing act. We all
kind of have our own technique in style, but basically,
like let's say, for example, let's say the contest is
a Saturday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. You're stretching your stomach, eating
like a maniac, you know, trying to get your stomach
as stretched as you can. Thursday will be a lot
of fluid, Friday will be a lot of fluid, no eating,
(03:35):
and you kind of go from being full as humanly
possible to as empty as humanly possible.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
That's the best way to describe it.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
So then on contest to day, you have as much
real estate inside your body, yes, but as much like
you know, capacity as possible.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
Yeah, wow, that you know, you you painted that picture
rather well. And I know you just placed third in
the annual Nathan's Hot Dog eating contest on the fourth
of July's that's a big time yet forty five and
a half dogs in ten minutes.
Speaker 3 (04:06):
That is absolutely incredible.
Speaker 2 (04:09):
And I know Joey Chustnet ended up winning that, but
you've actually beaten Joey in some other eating competitions, right.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
Yeah, Look, obviously Joey's the goat. He's been doing this
twenty two years now. I'm into my fourth year so
I'm trying to try to make up, you know, make
up time with the base. But yeah, actually, like Joey
is the undisputed He's the hot dog chap Man, Like,
I don't know how he does it, but I've actually
beaten him. I've been a few of his world records,
but I've beaten him head to head in the last
three chicken wing contests. The chicken wing so I'm actually
(04:40):
your chicken, like like hot dogs are Joey's thing. Yeah,
And don't get me wrong, Joey has a lot of
really strong suits, right, but yeah, I'm actually for some reason,
I'm really good at chicken wings. And I've beaten him
three times in a row.
Speaker 3 (04:53):
Are these bones with chicken wings or with bones?
Speaker 1 (04:57):
No? No bones? So it's all about to pick, right,
stripping the meat off the bone and the techniquing it.
And because they weigh your bowl, right, so basically you
get a twenty pound bowl of wings, and like if
you only bite out of the wing and chuck it
back in the bowl, like you can do that. Yeah,
but at the end of the day, like they're going
to weigh your bowl. So the more meat you eat,
you know, sorry, didn't mean to right there. But the
(05:19):
more meat that gets eat it, the more chance you
have a winning right. So I have a really good
technique of like stripping the meat off the bone and
you know, eating more meat than anybody else and me
a lot of time.
Speaker 3 (05:29):
Dang, that is wild. This is so fascinating.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
And You've actually got a documentary coming to Amazon Prime
on August twenty second called James Can Eat properly titled
and in the trailer it shows you spent a long
time in the hospital.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Was that from competitive eating?
Speaker 1 (05:46):
No, definitely not. So. I've got a very rare autoimmune disease.
It's called gin Barre syndrome. It's super rare. Not many
people have it. Me obviously being from Australia, it was
like not unheard of, but it was a rare feeding
it took them frames to actually properly diagnose me. I
ended up spending almost two years in the hospital with
(06:07):
that kind of trying to get that, I guess under control.
There's no cure for that autoimmune disease, so I just
kind of live with it. But I'm definitely through the worst,
bed and up and everything in season right.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
Good, good to hear man, that's good.
Speaker 4 (06:24):
To hear.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
Now, I want to get personal for a second. When
you eat this incredible amount of food, what's the restroom situation?
Speaker 3 (06:33):
Like, is it is? Are you just parked in there
for a second? Does your wife just clear the house?
Like I gotta imagine that's not a pretty thing. We
have separate butlers.
Speaker 5 (06:44):
Always the amounts of food I sometimes eat, I leave
home without baby wipes, I need about, you know, twenty
or thirty minutes quiet time sometimes because it does get.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Well, twenty thirty minutes is what I averages that she.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Has her own bathroom.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
For good research, she's got her own bathroom. No, but
I mean twenty to thirty minutes is my average. So
that's just from that.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
That's yeah, but it's kind of like, yeah, so you
go from like hot flushes to cold flushes, and then
you get like paying for a little bit.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
So you kind of sit there and like, you know,
reevaluate your life choices and then you kind of back
at it and you get these intense Tommy cramch Oh,
my contest can be rough, like don't get you know,
like the contest up the market can be a.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
Lot, so like you kind of just deal with it
and yeah, yeah, it is what it is.
Speaker 3 (07:36):
It's basically Mario's Thursday. Yeah yeah, damn that is.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
That is impressive and I'm looking forward to checking out
the documentary.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
James.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
Good luck with everything and everyone, please be sure to
check out the new documentary James Can Eat, which is
coming to Amazon Prime August twenty second.
Speaker 3 (07:53):
Thanks for checking in, man, Thank you guys so much
for having me. I really appreciate it. You got a buddy,
take care of low.
Speaker 4 (08:00):
Mario Lopez
Host
Mario Lopez
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