The Winter Olympics have never held any particular attraction for me…usually it equates to plenty of warmed over reruns and boredom. The Fox network, however, (in their infinite wisdom) recently aired an athletic “event” of Olympic proportion that captivated me and thousands of viewers worldwide. Step aside Sarah Hughes –the US figure skating gold medalist- the Glutton Bowl is coming to town!

If you missed this event, you really (really!) lost out on a classic piece of Americana with an international flair. This contest was a blend of Fear Factor, Battle Dome and a cheesy bodybuilding contest (well, I guess those are all cheesy aren’t they?!) in maximum overdrive. Approximately forty of the worlds most practiced gluttons, er-uhm…Power Eaters (yes, that’s more p.c.), competed against each other for the title of World Champion Glutton. The competition consisted of eight separate events with five different contestants in each round. The winners of each heat were pitted against one another in a grand finale to determine the champion. The plot twist in this competition was in the types of cuisine. Sure, there were the requisite hot dog and hamburger rounds (no condiments!), but there was also much more exotic fare.

Contestants in this event were mostly American residents, but there was a wide variety of contestants including a Ukrainian, Japanese and a Nevada Elvis impersonator dressed as…you guessed it…Elvis. The physical stature for most of the contestants was LARGE. One contestant weighed in over 400 pounds and another was a measly 135 pounds. Oddly enough there were also several female contestants (how’d you like to take her home for dinner?!) but none made the final gorge.

Each round was judged on quantity eaten within a given time period.

Here is a breakdown of the contest:

Round 1 - Boiled eggs! Eric Booker won after downing 32 hard boiled eggs. Give that man a beer to wash it all down! Just beware of the fallout afterwards…

Round 2 – Butter! Don Lerman quaffed down 7 quarter pound sticks to win this one. Can you say lubricated? Maybe heart attack is a better word!

Round 3 – Hamburgers! Jed Donahue stuffed his maw with 11 burgers to win this one. All were eaten without condiments of any kind. D-r-y m-o-u-t-h!

Round 4 – Mayonnaise! Oleg Zhonitskiy shut out all the competitors by consuming 8 pounds of body temperature mayonnaise from a salad bowl. I don’t want to know how that came out…yikes what a mental image!

Round 5 – Pickled Whole Cow Tongues! Bill Simmons destroyed the competition by devouring an entire 3 pound pickled cow tongue, gristle and all. He stunned the judges by calling for a second tongue after finishing the first long before the time had expired. This man was possessed!

Round 6 – Hot dogs (buns too)! Takeru Kobyashe blew away all competitors by powering down 32 hot dogs with the buns. No condiments! The real kick in the ass is that this guy only weighs 135 pounds. Hey, I am not making this up!

Round 7 – 3” diameter Sushi Roll laced with wasabi! Dominick Cardo caught the others by surprise when he devoured 3.8 feet of a 15 foot long X 3 inch diameter sushi roll spiked with a foot of wasabi at random lengths. You could definitely tell when each contestant got to the wasabi- that’s where all except Dominick quit!

Round 8 – Extra Large Rocky Mountain Oysters! If you don’t know what these are go check out your local pasture and what’s hanging lowest on the bulls… Chris Eyre won this round by forcing down 5 of the biggest “oysters” I have ever seen! At least they were boiled first, but Chris was the only one to clean his plate!

Finale – Boiled Cow Brains! The winners of the above rounds were pitted against one another for this finale. Amazingly it was the scrawny Takeru Kobyashe of Japan who took home the trophy for Worlds Biggest Glutton after he ingested more than 10 pounds of cow brains.

You haven’t lived until you’ve seen a grown human gobble down nearly three dozen boiled eggs and not puke from the sheer volume (at least they didn’t show it if he did hurl). There is no greater site than a man spooning mayonnaise into his mouth as if he were a diamond thief trying to ingest as many stones as possible before the cops arrive. This contest has to be the most entertaining televised event I have ever seen: pure trailer park, bare footed, cousin marrying, hillbilly delight. Move over Olympics…gluttony, pure gluttony is coming! Our Olympic athletes haven’t really competed until they have stretched out their gullets with a three pound pickled cows tongue! With any luck they will re-run this event during the summer so we can all relish the glory.