Vancouver International Airport was the scene of the 1st ever Japadog Eating Contest.  As a kick off to Take Fridays OFF at the airport.  Contestants were selected from hundreds of entries in the First week of August, they selected 6 hungry eaters to take part.

DJ Alibaba was the MC for the event and he gave an action packed play by play.

They got a great turnout for the lunchtime event.

Trays of 15 Japadog‘s were brought out for each contestant.  The goal was to eat as many Japadog‘s in a 10 minute period, not to spoil the end but no one got through there tray of hotdogs.

Lots of Vancouver media turned out for the event.

After a quick rundown of the rules and showing the trophy off it was time for business!

A small prayer was said before Japadog employee Toyoshi Imai started to stuff his face.

The competition varried from contestant to contestant-only one of the people were a “professional” eater.  Evan Cowe, Rei Van, Jonathan Alayon and Harry Shum gave it there best but my 2 favorite people were closest to closest to me.

Steven Thomson-the self-named “Sensei of Speed” from Vancouver and Toyoshi Imai from Surrey both get awards for most energetic performances.  The both had completely different techniques to get the Japadog‘s down.

Steven used the pro technique of bun dunking and eating the sausages on there own while Toyoshi did something a little different.

All of the contestants had access to Japadog toppings-sauces, bonito flakes and nori so Toyoshi whipped up a Japadog classic-the Terimayo!

This totally got the Sensei’s attention but it didn’t stop there!

Toyoshi finished up the Terimayo and then started building another Japadog favorite.

He made a Okonomi complete with a heaping helping of bonito flakes but doing these special dog’s ended up slowing him down.

By now time was running thin and it was between Steven and Evan, you could say it was neck and neck.

Steven Thompson ended up beating Evan by a dog eating 7 while Evan downed 6.

Steven Thomson took the title of being the Top Dog and in the process took home a $50 Japadog gift card and $250 YVRBucks along with a stomach ache.

When asked what his winning strategy was all he could say is that not eating breakfast was key but one thing was for sure-he didn’t need to go for dinner that night!

My honorable mention and people’s choice award goes to Toyoshi Imai who kept us entertained with his creativity and enthusiasm.

The Japadog Eating Contest was a fun thing to check out and I’m curious to see if they have one next year.