Joey Chestnut Will Have His Own July 4 Hot Dog Eating Contest With Soldiers At Fort Bliss

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Since Joey Chestnut was banned from competing in this year's Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest in Coney Island, the world's best competitive eater is taking his talents to El Paso. Chestnut will challenge the soldiers at Fort Bliss to an Independence Day wiener-eating contest of their own.

Chomping on hot dogs with American soldiers on the Fourth of July? It doesn't get any more patriotic than that! And while Chestnut doesn't actually expect any of the service men and women to keep up with him, it's all in good fun.

"If they (each) break 10, that’d be pretty good," he told The Associated Press.

Joey Chestnut Will Have His Own July 4 Hot Dog Eating Contest With Soldiers At Fort Bliss

Joey Chestnut will compete against soldiers at Fort Bliss on Thursday.

(Getty Images)

Chestnut has been competing in the annual Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest since 2005 and hadn’t lost since 2015. In 2021, he set the current record of 76 hot dogs in 10 minutes. But organizers of the Nathan's event barred Chestnut from competing in 2024 due to a sponsorship conflict, which Chestnut said involved a deal with plant-based hot dog company Impossible Foods.

Major League Eating is hoping to work things out so that Chestnut can compete in 2025.

"I feel bullied," the 40-year-old said. "If I’m ever going to work with them [Nathan's] again, they’re going to have to apologize."

RELATED: Impossible Foods Tells OutKick To Get Its 'Vegan' Hot Dog Story Straight

So Fort Bliss took this opportunity to invite Joey Jaws to join their July Fourth celebration instead. And Chestnut was happy to accept.

"ABSOLUTELY!!! Thank you @FortBlissTexas for the invitation!!" he responded on X. "I'm honored to celebrate America's birthday with U.S. ARMY soldiers and their families. Bring me your best 4 eaters and I'll take them down, combined!"

Instead of the 10-minute competition held by Nathan's, the Fort Bliss contest will last only five. So judging by his past performances at Coney Island, we're expecting Joey to put down somewhere between 35-40 hot dogs in the allotted time.

As of right now, it’s unclear if the event will be televised or streamed anywhere. But someone needs to get on that — for America!