Pacing like a caged jungle cat under the metal roof of the Americus Farmer’s market, he was stretching his jaws, swinging his arms and gently hoping with anticipation. He was eager, he was ready and he was anxious to defend his title as the Pecan Festival’s reigning hot dog eating champion.
Hoping to break his record of 20 dogs in under five minutes, the 22-year-old looked at his competitors and sized each of them up before confidently seizing his seat at the center of the table.
But a late edition to the lineup of challengers vying to strip Avery of his title added some drama to the race he had been confident of winning; Marty Belcher, a two-time meat-munching champion himself.
Delicately unscrewing the caps on his two bottles of water like a mechanic preparing oil for a finely-tuned engine, Avery nestled up to his folding chair, folded his hands in a prayer-like alignment with his head and focused.
Meanwhile, the older, veteran eater was Avery’s opposite. The large, lumbering man nonchalantly strolled up to the table, taking the seat just off Avery’s left like he was pulling up to a bar stool after a long day at the office.
He had been here before.
Four years ago he gobbled his way to an eating championship before knocking back title number two a year later. In his mind, it was only a two-year hiatus that had kept the valuable $100 cash prize out of his hands ever since, giving Avery a chance to shine in his stead
The rules were simple, eat as many dogs as you could in five minutes and win the money, but in the dog-eat-dog world of food competition, the contests are usually anything but simple.
As the competition began, Belcher jumped out to an early lead, scarfing three dogs down in near-record time. Avery’s self-described strategy of carefully grinding the dogs down and saving the guzzling for the home stretch seemed doomed from the start.
But like a modern-day tortoise and hare, after gaining a three-dog lead, Belcher calmly flipped open his cell phone and took a call while continuing, albeit more slowly, to eat. It was Avery’s chance to seize momentum, to strip victory from the seemingly from the swollen jaws of defeat.
But alas, as the bits of bread and meat littering empty plates began to mount and the unforgiving hands of time continued to tick away, all hope of a victory for the reigning champ departed like the space remaining in his stomach.
When the final tally was read, Marty Belcher, the business-owner turned hot dog eating competitor, had downed 11 dogs to Avery’s nine, making him the new undisputed champ of devouring processed meat in Sumter County.
“I really didn’t have a strategy, I just ate as much as I could,” he said while being congratulated by his fans. “I guess you just do it.”
Ever the sportsman, Avery was one of the first over to shake the hand of the man who had stripped his title.
“It happens,” he said.
And as the two left the Farmer’s Market, each headed back into the revelry of the Pecan Festival and leaving only remnants of flesh and bread and water in their wake, they each buried their hot-dog hatchets only to be wielded next fall, when they will likely meet again in this shining city on a hill to wage gastrointestinal war.
