Pretzel Power

Unfortunately I was right about the power of the pretzel. No matter how hard I tried to speed up and eat faster, I could not. The taste was just good...too good. I was torn. I wanted to speed up for the sake of doing better in the contest, but at the same time I wanted to enjoy the delicious flavor of the Pretzel Twister pretzel. I went back and forth with urges to eat faster to win and then to eat slower to enjoy the delectable food. In the end I decided it was best to compromise. I would eat one pretzel fast and then eat one slow.

Luckily there were plenty of pretzels left after the contest. I knew I had a long trip back to Jacksonville Beach from Miami, so I took two plates of five pretzels. I sat down with some friends of mine that came to see the contest and enjoyed ten more pretzels. So delicious. After I finished them I thought about the number of pretzels I had eaten and when I did the math I had a good warm feeling inside me. No, it was not because I realized the total amount of pretzels I ate was more than Joey that day (11.5 during the contest + 10 after = 21.5 Hall's total pretzels > 21 Joey's total pretzels). The warm feeling inside me was all those pretzels. (I thought that would be obvious.) ;o)

I also have a few videos, but I don't know how to post them. Any know how?

The Eater's Poll (Jan. 25, 2007)

IFOCE EATER'S POLL TOP 20

Rank. Eater's Name (First-place votes) (Points)

1. Takeru Kobayashi (10) (238)

2. Joey Chestnut (2) (229)

3. Patrick Bertoletti (217)

4. Sonya Thomas (197)

5. Bob Shoudt (193)

6. (tie) Chip Simpson (161)

6. (tie) Tim Janus (161)

6. (tie) Rich LeFevre (161)

9. Seaver Miller (114)

10. Crazy Legs Conti (106)

11. Arturo Rios (102)

12. Hall Hunt (93)

13. Erik Denmark (90)

14. Jed Donahue (80)

15. Joe LaRue (55)

16.(tie) Dale Boone (44)

16.(tie) Juliet Lee (44)

18. Patrick Philbin (42)

19. Justin Mih (40)

20. Ron Koch (23)

Also receiving votes: Loren Yarbrough (19), Larry McNeil (18), Allen Goldstein (18), Jim Reeves (14), Sam Vise (12), Brian Subich (11), Todd Yeates (6), Brian Seiken(5), El Toro Jimenez (4), Kevin Lipsitz (4), Frank Wach (2), Jason Erb (2), Eric Livingston (2), Pat Bruss (1)

The Eater's Poll will come out TODAY!

I am counting up the final totals now! Once all the votes are in I will be posting the results later on TODAY. On the same day that John F. Kennedy delivered the first live presidential television news conference, www.hallhooverhunt.blogspot.com will be unveiling the first ever Eater's Poll.
Due to overwhelming response via this site, my email, and myspace I have gotten in contact with more than a dozen people that want to participate in the voting for the first Eater's Poll! In the future polls I already have many more commited to vote, which will be making the poll even more accurate and include more eaters. The Eater's Poll will hopefully become a permanent fixture in the eating community providing a forum where they can cast their vote and express their opinions on where everyone stands. More and more eaters, writers, and fans are going to be casting their votes on the upcoming polls.
The poll is here for your enjoyment. Please take a good look at the poll and express your opinion on what you think. Also, everyone is encouraged to become part of the voting themselves. If you didn't get your votes in already for this first poll be sure to get your votes in for the next one! Just send an email to HallHunt@comcast.net. to get on the list for casting votes in the upcoming polls! THE FIRST EVER EATER'S POLL WILL BE COMING OUT TODAY!

RANKING, POLLS, ETC. ?

Recently I have been missing all of the different IFOCE rankings that use to be floating around the internet. At one point Bubba and Larry had rankings on their "buffet" website and Beautiful Brian also had rankings on his site too. These were both supplemental of course to the official IFOCE website.
I realize that if I do any rankings there will be "upsets" every week with a lower ranked eater beating a higher ranked eater. But doesn't it change from food to food and day to day anyways who ends up winning? So, no rankings are ever 100% accurate. Otherwise Ohio State would have killed Florida in the BCS national championship game. (I had to say it!) That is why I figured I may do my own rankings.
I always loved reading all the different rankings and could not wait to see when and how they changed. I am sure there are others out there that would love to see another set of rankings come out for the same reasons I would sit back and analyze them myself.
One ranking system I am thinking of having also may be something like the coaches poll. I would email/message a group of eaters and/or competitive eating fans/writers and have them vote in every week or month what they think the rankings should be. As you can tell I am not sure exactly how I am going to do it, but I have a good idea of what I want to do. Before I do anything though I wanted to see what you all think. Do you have any ideas of what, in your opinion would work best? Is there anyone that would like to volunteer to help vote in every week or month? I really want to try something out, for at least a little while and see how it turns out. I deifintely think a group effort would have everything turn out best, so if you are interested at all in helping out please let me know. Or if you have any ideas of your own please send me a message.
Thanks. I hope we can make something happen.

BEAUTIFUL BRIAN

I am glad to hear that Beautiful Brian is coming back in full-swing with his website www.beautifulbrian.com . He has always provided much insightful and behind the scenes information on everything relating to the sport of competitive eating. Despite the recent scare that he may go on hiatus for a time, he is back. I am very pleased to be able to announce this on my website. I am glad BBs website is here to stay!

"Erik the Red" Denmark vs. Pat "Deep Dish" Bertoletti

The subtitle of this matchup is Seattle Seahawks vs. Chicago Bears. I am excited to see this game. It should be a good matchup. Who is going to win? I am going to have to cheer for the Bears since they are led by a former Gator. There are also three other Gators that are playing for the Bears and the Seahawks only have 2 Gators I believe and have more Seminoles. I believe the Bears won last time 6-37. Of course that was back when Rex was on a role. I know also it is hard to beat the same team twice during the season. Along the same lines the Bears have home field advantage which is really hard to beat. That is why I had to go to the tie-breaker and find the ratio of Gators playing on each team to pick my winner. Though I am cheering for the Bears, I will be cheering more for Erik to eat all those hotdogs. Go Erik!

Florida is on a roll!

I just want to say congratulations to the University of Florida football team! Now the Gators have the national championship in both football and basketball. I believe that is the first time that has happened in the NCAA. To have the basketball and football championship is fantastic!
I loved watching the football game with all the other Florida Alum, students, and family.
But now the only sporting event I am concerned with is the Pretzel Twister pretzel contest. I was reading the IFOCE website the other day and read all of the predictions. I am not going to say exactly how, but I have a good feeling the predictions from 1 through 5 are going to be very different. One thing I will mention in particular is that Mr. Janus is not listed in the top five finishers even though competitive eating news has him listed to compete. This may be becuase he is not known for always doing well in some events where more chewing is taking place. I would normally agree with this, except for the fact that his overall speed has been increasing tremendously as of late and he is also the master of technique.
To my knowledge soft pretzels have never been used in a contest before. This is not some food that everyone has tried before. I know and respect these pretzels. Depending on the weather conditions, they may go down very slowly. The weather may not be the only factor that slows things down. The eaters may also find themselves slowing down to enjoy the delicious taste.