A good Fourth of July celebration doesn't just happen. You've got to prepare.

Willie's hosting a Fourth of July party and we're learning techniques because he's going

to host another hot dog eating contest at his house. We're going to have almost do a hot dog

eating contest. I have my tonsils out last September so there's a lot more space to in terms

of just like airway ability. We recently met Willie Thier in downtown Washington DC at

the foot of a big outdoor stage waiting for a much more serious hot dog eating contest

to begin. The final qualifying event for the Super Bowl Olympics and World Cup of competitive

eating all wrapped up in one bun. You probably know at the annual July 4th contest at Nathan

at New York's Coney Island the one Joey Chestnut has won year after year. Joey hits the

50 marks still a magic number even though he blows by it every year that's still a significant

number. In just a few minutes nine people would take the stage to gorge on as many hot

dogs as they could fit in their mouths. But stop finishers would punch a ticket to the

big event at Nathan's on Tuesday. Thier is excited. His friend Becca Harris not quite

as pumped. I was just warned to stay out of a splash zone so I'm backing up a little

bit because I am very apprehensive about how this is going to go down. Harris has the

same question as so many others in the crowd. Why do Americans do this? I mean God only

knows right God only knows I feel like it's it's some kind of like an all-girl part of

their culture at this point like hot dogs so. Consider this the tradition of eating

competitions goes back centuries but nobody has done it up quite like the U.S. This

Independence Day we dig into the distinctly American tradition of hot dog eating. From

NPR I'm Scott Detro it's Monday July 3rd. It's considered this from NPR and we're going

to go back to that hot dog contest in Washington where producer Alejandra Marquez Hansa and

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