Sonya Thomas (born Lee Sun-kyung on July 26, 1967), also known by her nickname The Black Widow, and "The Leader of the Four Horsemen of the Esophagus", is a South Korean-born American competitive eater from

Alexandria, Virginia Alexandria is an independent city (United States), independent city in Northern Virginia, United States. It lies on the western bank of the Potomac River approximately south of Washington, D.C., D.C. The city's population of 159,467 at the 2020 ...

. Thomas joined the International Federation of Competitive Eating in 2003 and quickly rose to the top of the ranks, beating competitive eaters such as Eric Booker. Her nickname "The Black Widow" refers to her ability to regularly defeat men four to five times her size.Moon, Amy.
ASIAN POP: Superchomp Korean-born Sonya Thomas is the No. 1 ranked female competitive eater in the USA
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SFGate.com
'' May 26, 2005. Retrieved on June 25, 2006. While the size of her stomach is only slightly larger than normal, her skinny build is perhaps her biggest advantage, allowing her stomach to expand more readily since it is not surrounded by the ring of fat common in other heavy eaters. She holds records in over 25 eating competitions, and in December 2008, she set the world record for fruit-cake eaten in 10 minutes. On July 4, 2005, she ate 37

hot dog A hot dog is a grilled, steamed, or boiled sausage served in the slit of a partially sliced bun. The term ''hot dog'' can also refer to the sausage itself. The sausage used is a wiener ( Vienna sausage) or a frankfurter ( Frankfurter Würs ...

s in 12 minutes at

Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest The Nathan's Famous International Hot Dog Eating Contest is an annual American hot dog competitive eating competition. It is held each year on July 4 at Nathan's Famous' original, and best-known, restaurant at the corner of Surf and Stillwell ...

, setting a then-record for American competitors (which was also the female record). On August 8, 2005, she consumed 35

bratwurst ''Bratwurst'' () is a type of German sausage made from pork or, less commonly, beef or veal. The name is derived from the Old High German , from , finely chopped meat, and , sausage, although in modern German it is often associated with the ver ...

s in 10 minutes, beating the previous 10-minute record of 19.5 bratwursts, although her record was beaten in 2006 by

Takeru Kobayashi is a retired Japanese competitive eating, competitive eater. Described as "the godfather of competitive eating", he is a six-time Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest champion and widely credited with popularizing the sport. Competition and records ...

. On July 4, 2011, Thomas became the first champion of Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest for Women. Eating 40 hot dogs in 10 minutes, Thomas earned the inaugural pink Pepto Bismol Belt and won $10,000. She defended and held on to that title the following year eating 46 hot dogs. On July 4, 2013, she again defended her title by eating 36 hot dogs, just beating out Juliet Lee who ate 36 hot dogs.

Competition

Champion

Thomas's first major victory that put her on the competitive eating map was in the 2004 Wing Bowl, where she became the first woman to win a Wing Bowl. Her tally of 32 hot dogs in the 2004 Nathan's Hot Dog contest was the most ever eaten by a male or female American competitor at the time. The only eaters besides Kobayashi to defeat Thomas between the 2004 and 2005 Nathan's contests were Bill "El Wingador" Simmons in the 2005 Wing Bowl, and Dale Boone, who cooled overheated baked beans in order to win an eating contest. On July 4, 2011, Thomas became the first champion of Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest for Women. Eating 40 hot dogs in 10 minutes, Thomas earned the inaugural Pink Belt and won $10,000. Thomas had won 1st place in the

National Buffalo Wing Festival National Buffalo Wing Festival or Wing Fest is a weekend festival held on Labor Day weekend at Sahlen Field in Buffalo, New York, United States, celebrating the Buffalo style chicken wing. The festival culminates with the IFOCE sanctioned B ...

US chicken wing eating championship five-years straight from 2007 to 2011. On September 4, 2011, she attained the United States Chicken Wing Eating Championship in

Buffalo, New York Buffalo is a Administrative divisions of New York (state), city in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York and county seat of Erie County, New York, Erie County. It lies in Western New York at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of ...

, by eating 183 chicken wings in 12 minutes. On September 2, 2012 Joey Chestnut consumed 191 wings, weighing in 12 minutes to take competitive-eating trophy from the five-year champion Sonya Thomas.

Challenge and response

When Thomas undertook a challenging schedule of three contests in three cities on Labor Day weekend 2005, she had not lost a contest to anyone besides Kobayashi since the Wing Bowl in early February. Several last-minute victories foreshadowed that her streak would not last forever. At the Buffalo Wing Festival in

Buffalo, NY Buffalo is a city in the U.S. state of New York and county seat of Erie County. It lies in Western New York at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of the Niagara River on the Canadian border. With a population of 278,349 according to ...

, Ms. Thomas lost to Eric "Badlands" Booker in a chicken wing contest and then lost a waffle eating contest in Atlanta the next day to the fast-rising rookie Joey Chestnut, giving her a two event losing streak to replace her winning streak. Thomas' waffle defeat was avenged on Labor Day, however, when she out-ate Chestnut in the Chattanooga, TN Krystal Square Off qualifier. Thomas ate 57 Krystal Burgers to Chestnut's 56. Before the GoldenPalace.com turkey eating contest in New York City Thanksgiving Eve, Thomas had gone three months without winning a non-qualifying contest, although she did have two impressive victories in qualifiers during that span. It appeared that Chestnut would soon claim the title of the leading American eater from Thomas. The civil engineering student from

San Jose State San José State University (San Jose State or SJSU) is a Public university, public research university in San Jose, California. Established in 1857, SJSU is the List of oldest schools in California, oldest public university on the West Coast of ...

had defeated Thomas in three of their last four match-ups and was the first eater to lead Kobayashi for the majority of a contest at the Krystal Square Off in Chattanooga the previous week. Although Thomas came in third, the silver lining was her domination of Kobayashi on a pound for pound basis: Thomas 56 burgers / 100 lb. = 0.56, Kobayashi 67 burgers / 170 lb. = 0.39. At the turkey contest, Thomas was able to dramatically reverse her recent slump and defeat Chestnut without last second heroics, which she had not been able to do since Nathan's hot dog contest on July 4. Thomas' momentum continued the following week at a meatball contest in Atlantic City. Her total of beat Chestnut by and almost doubled her total from the previous year's meatball contest. Thomas' continued improvement, along with Chestnut's rapid ascent, gave Kobayashi more to worry about in 2006 than at any previous time in his dominant career. On August 13, 2006, Thomas won her Asian debut competition in Hong Kong while setting her 28th eating record, by consuming 17 Chinese-style lotus seed buns in 12 minutes.

In the media

She was featured in a MasterCard Paypass commercial. By accident, she meets

, a male competitor, in a convenience store. Their eyes flash, and they begin a hot dog eating duel, which they pay for using the Paypass card. In 2005, Thomas earned more than $50,000 in prize money and made extensive media appearances.

Training and competition notes

* She exercises by walking on an inclined treadmill for two hours, five times per week. * She regularly visits all-you-can-eat buffets at restaurants. * The night before a contest, she fasts all night in order to put an edge on her appetite. * Thomas exercises up to two hours a day on an incline treadmill, and has maintained her weight since she started competing in 2003, down from when she worked as a typist in Korea. Her lowest weight has been at Wing Bowl XII in 2004. * She only eats one very large meal a day, which takes several hours for her to complete. This meal includes green vegetables and fresh fruit. A typical post-work meal for her would be three large orders of fries, a chicken

Whopper The Whopper is the signature hamburger brand of international fast food restaurant chain Burger King, its Australian franchise Hungry Jack's, and BK Whopper Bar kiosks. Introduced in 1957 in response to the large burger size of a local resta ...

, 20 chicken tenders, and two diet soft drinks. * She does not practice eating at speed for more than a two-minute period. * Her favorite foods to eat at competitions are hard-boiled eggs, oysters and chicken wings. * She claims to have had remaining stomach capacity after all her contests, except after eating the Barrick burger, which took her 48 minutes to finish. She ate enough oysters to set the untimed record for oyster eating after the 2005 oyster competition was officially over. * She had difficulty eating a hot dog in less than a minute when she first started training for her first contest, the 2003 Nathan's qualifier. After practicing, she was able to consume 18 hot dogs in 12 minutes. * She out-ate Randy Thomas, a pro football player noted for his appetite, consuming of shrimp in 10 minutes to his .

Records

Asparagus Asparagus (''Asparagus officinalis'') is a perennial flowering plant species in the genus ''Asparagus (genus), Asparagus'' native to Eurasia. Widely cultivated as a vegetable crop, its young shoots are used as a spring vegetable. Description ...

** of

tempura is a typical Japanese dish that usually consists of seafood and vegetables that have been coated in a thin batter and deep-fried. Tempura originated in the 16th century, when Portuguese Jesuits brought the Western-style cooking method of ...

deep fried asparagus spears in 10 minutes *

Cheesecake Cheesecake is a dessert made with a soft fresh cheese (typically cottage cheese, cream cheese, quark or ricotta), eggs, and sugar. It may have a crust or base made from crushed cookies (or digestive biscuits), graham crackers, pastry, ...

s ** of Downtown Atlantic cheesecake in 9 minutes * Chicken nuggets ** 80 chicken nuggets in 5 minutes *

Chicken The chicken (''Gallus gallus domesticus'') is a domesticated subspecies of the red junglefowl (''Gallus gallus''), originally native to Southeast Asia. It was first domesticated around 8,000 years ago and is now one of the most common and w ...

wings ** 183 chicken wings in 12 minutes (2011 record) * Chili ** of Chili in 6 minutes * Crabcakes ** 46 ounce crabcakes in 10 minutes *

Egg An egg is an organic vessel grown by an animal to carry a possibly fertilized egg cell (a zygote) and to incubate from it an embryo within the egg until the embryo has become an animal fetus that can survive on its own, at which point the ...

s ** 65 hard boiled eggs in 6 minutes and 40 seconds *

Fruitcake Fruitcake or fruit cake is a cake made with Candied fruit, candied or dried fruit, Nut (fruit), nuts, and spices, and optionally soaked in liquor, spirits. In the United Kingdom, certain rich versions may be iced and Cake decorating, decorated. ...

s ** of Wegman's Fruitcake in 10 minutes *

Gyoza ''Jiaozi'' or Gyoza (; ) are a type of Chinese dumpling. ''Jiaozi'' typically consist of a ground meat or vegetable filling wrapped into a thinly rolled piece of dough, which is then sealed by pressing the edges together. ''Jiaozi'' can be ...

** 206 gyoza in 10 minutes *

Hamburger A hamburger (or simply a burger) consists of fillings—usually a patty of ground meat, typically beef—placed inside a sliced bun or bread roll. The patties are often served with cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, pickles, bacon, or chilis ...

s ** 7 burgers ( "Thickburgers") in 10 minutes * Jambalaya ** of

crawfish Crayfish are freshwater crustaceans belonging to the infraorder Astacidea, which also contains lobsters. Taxonomically, they are members of the superfamilies Astacoidea and Parastacoidea. They breathe through feather-like gills. Some spe ...

jambalaya in 10 minutes *

Lobster Lobsters are Malacostraca, malacostracans Decapoda, decapod crustaceans of the family (biology), family Nephropidae or its Synonym (taxonomy), synonym Homaridae. They have long bodies with muscular tails and live in crevices or burrows on th ...

** 44 lobsters totaling of lobster meat in 12 minutes * MoonPies ** 38 Moonpies in 8 minutes *

Oyster Oyster is the common name for a number of different families of salt-water bivalve molluscs that live in marine or brackish habitats. In some species, the valves are highly calcified, and many are somewhat irregular in shape. Many, but no ...

s ** 46 dozen

Acme Acme is Ancient Greek (ἀκμή; English transliteration: ''akmē'') for "the peak", "zenith" or "prime". It may refer to: Arts, entertainment and games * ''Acme'' (album), an album by the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion * Acme and Septimius, a fic ...

Oysters in 10 minutes(2005) ** 29 dozen

Oysters in 8 minutes (2009)-Louisiana oyster season produced much larger oysters in 2009 explaining the slower pace -reclaimed the World Oyster Eating title *

Pizza Pizza is an Italian cuisine, Italian, specifically Neapolitan cuisine, Neapolitan, dish typically consisting of a flat base of Leavening agent, leavened wheat-based dough topped with tomato, cheese, and other ingredients, baked at a high t ...

** 6 extra large Bocce pizza slices in 15 minutes * Pulled

pork Pork is the culinary name for the meat of the pig (''Sus domesticus''). It is the most commonly consumed meat worldwide, with evidence of pig animal husbandry, husbandry dating back to 8000–9000 BCE. Pork is eaten both freshly cooke ...

** 23 pulled pork

sandwich A sandwich is a Dish (food), dish typically consisting variously of meat, cheese, sauces, and vegetables used as a filling between slices of bread, or placed atop a slice of bread; or, more generally, any dish in which bread serves as a ''co ...

es in 10 minutes *

Taco A taco (, , ) is a traditional Mexican cuisine, Mexican dish consisting of a small hand-sized corn tortilla, corn- or Flour tortilla, wheat-based tortilla topped with a Stuffing, filling. The tortilla is then folded around the filling and fing ...

s ** 43 soft tacos in 11 minutes * Tater tots ** 250 tater tots in 5 minutes * Turducken ** Turducken.com

Thanksgiving Thanksgiving is a national holiday celebrated on various dates in October and November in the United States, Canada, Saint Lucia, Liberia, and unofficially in countries like Brazil and Germany. It is also observed in the Australian territory ...

Dinner in 12 minutes

Nathan's Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest results

National Buffalo Wing Festival competition wins

Post-competitive eating career

By 2023, she was described as "semi-retired", working as a manager at a

Burger King Burger King Corporation (BK, stylized in all caps) is an American multinational chain store, chain of hamburger fast food restaurants. Headquartered in Miami-Dade County, Florida, the company was founded in 1953 as Insta-Burger King, a Jacks ...

in Maryland.

References

External links

Official website

International Federation of Competitive Eating (IFOCE) profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Thomas, Sonya 1967 births Living people South Korean emigrants to the United States American competitive eaters American sportswomen American sportspeople of Korean descent Sportspeople from North Jeolla Province 21st-century American women 20th-century American sportswomen