ELI5 - How do competitive eaters such as Eric the electric not damage their bodies?

Submitted by Iron-Wall t3_126cmwn in explainlikeimfive

I understand many of these guys have healthy lifestyles outside of eating with a regular diet and exercise, hence it's easy to maintain a healthy weight.

However, when they consume up to 50x the recommended daily intake of sugar, or 20x the recommended salt intake as I've seen in some challenges, how do the kidneys/liver/heart not suffer overload?

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Comments

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Hefty-Set5236 t1_je8oenl wrote

My understanding is that they regurgitate (vomit) up the consumed food after the competition has ended. They also don't compete on a daily, or even weekly basis, for the most part.

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NickyXIII t1_jea539c wrote

Vomiting is expelling digested or partially digested food.

Regurgitating is expelling undigested food.

Remember cows regurgitate so that they can swallow it again for digestion.

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Hefty-Set5236 t1_jea59rd wrote

Ah, I didn't realize that, thank you

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NickyXIII t1_jea5mmt wrote

The more you know. Now wait either 4 years or 4 minutes for the only moment it will be a relevant trivia fact you can share

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NETSPLlT t1_jeau5zx wrote

So op got it right. It could be either depending on if some has digested or not.

Unless you're actually thinking of rumination. ;)

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NickyXIII t1_jeaw86a wrote

I wasn't attempting to correct them, I was just sharing. Rumination would be the entire process ;;;;)

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VinylJitsu t1_je9ke7f wrote

The short answer is, just like pretty much every competitive doer of anything, they do. Above a certain leve, performance costs health.

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Fortunfavrsbold t1_je92b5j wrote

It's definitely a skill most people do not have. Maybe they train to eat more and exercise like crazy and not eat for a few days, maybe they vomit it all up afterwards, or maybe they just have larger stomachs that can hold excessive food. It might also vary from competitor to competitor

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