For many athletes, their profession started out as a childhood passion. Love of tee ball kindled into the dedication to be a major league pitcher, or early hunting lessons laid the groundwork for an expert sharpshooter.

Competitive eating doesn’t fit that mold.

“It’s not one of those things where you’re a little kid going, ‘I want to be the next Joey Chestnut!’” says Matt Stonie. “It all started off when I was just going to college: I was 19-years-old and there was a lobster roll eating contest five minutes away from my house. It was 1,000 bucks if you won the contest, and even if you didn’t win, you got free lobster rolls. So I signed up, and on my first go I beat the guy who was expected to win by half a lobster roll.”

“I’m definitely in the gym five times a week doing cardio or weights. I’ve made this my full-time job, and I spend a lot of time taking care of myself. It’s hard, it’s not like we have superhuman metabolisms.”

Stonie has a number of pork-based records under his belt, and is the number one ranked competitive eater in Major League Eating. But he’s probably best known as the guy who unseated Joey Chestnut, the eight-time champion, at this year’s Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest. Nathan’s is the ne plus ultra of competitive eating, launching both Chestnut and Takeru Kobayashi to stardom in the U.S. And now, after polishing off 62 dogs in 10 minutes, Stonie is the reigning champion.

Although winter is technically the competitive eating off-season (most of the big contests happen in the spring and summer), Stonie is still keeping busy. He just set a record at a Smithfield Foods event where he ate 71 fresh pork ribs in a leisurely five minutes (that’s seven-ish racks of ribs) and he’s also got his YouTube channel to stay in eating shape. The words he uses to describe his videos are “fun” and “not intense”; how else would you describe recreationally eating 20 pounds of chicken katsu curry?

Moreso than most athletes we’ve spoken to, Stonie’s diet and workouts fluctuate a lot. Despite the fact that eating is his literal job, Stonie clocks in at a modest 120 pounds. “My regime changes all the time—sometimes I’m working out more, sometimes less. It really just comes down to diet and watching what you’re eating after a contest. But I’m definitely in the gym five times a week doing cardio or weights. I’ve made this my full-time job, and I spend a lot of time taking care of myself. It’s hard, it’s not like we have superhuman metabolisms.”

As for the actual eating part of the training, when prepping for a contest, Stonie usually does two serious meals a week, with two to three days of rest between. “I like to relate it to body-building. You go to the gym, pump weights as hard as you can, then you let your muscles relax for a few days.”

While competitive eaters train to deal with high volumes of food, they still feel full and bloated like everyone else, and don’t gluttonously love everything they eat. The contest that gave Stonie the most trouble was a pie-eating contest, where he ate 80 slices of pumpkin pie. “It’s a process,” he says. “We’re professionals, we aren’t just average Joes who have big appetites. We’ve calculated our techniques and approaches to these contests, we’ve trained our bodies and worked for what we’ve accomplished.”

After a competition though, his body is in serious recovery mode. One day of bloating, one day of losing water weight, one day of mostly getting back to normal, all while living mostly on water, whey protein, and multi-vitamins.

“I think there are two misconceptions. One is that we just show up and eat a lot of food, and two is about how hard it is. I talk to people and they say, ‘Oh, I could never do what you do, I could probably eat like, three racks of ribs,’ and I’m like, ‘I don’t think you can.’ What we do is not easy.”

BreakfastProtein shake (100 calories), cup of coffee, multivitamins

Three Hours Later BreakfastProtein shake, carrots

LunchProtein shake, apples

Three Hours Later LunchProtein shake, handful of almonds

DinnerProtein shake, slices of bread

Before BedCasein protein, almonds

Luke Darby is a contributor to GQ, covering news, entertainment, and the environment. A Louisiana native, he now resides in Cleveland, and his writing has also appeared in Outside, the Dallas Observer, and Marie Claire.Related Stories for GQReal Life DietHealthHealth