BROOKLYN, NY - The 1st Annual "Atomic Wings" Buffalo Wing Eating Contest was held on Saturday, July 18th, at 5:30 p.m., just off the boardwalk at Coney Island. The event was sponsored by the Atomic Wing restaurant chain and Frank’s RedHot Sauce. Ten finalists were chosen from a group of over 100 people to compete for the opportunity to be crowned "Atomic Wings Wing King of New York.’

Atomic Wings is a fast growing franchise with locations in Manhattan and Brooklyn. They teamed up with Frank’s RedHot to sponsor the event. Franks RedHot was the original sauce used to create the first-ever Buffalo wings in 1964 in Buffalo, New York. RedHot is now located in Parsippany, New Jersey.

Sign-ups for the event began at 12 noon and continued until 2:30 p.m. at the Atomic Wings Booth located at the center of Stillwell Avenue between Surf and Boardwalk. The event also marked the 20th anniversary of Atomic Wings. In celebration of its anniversary, Atomic Wings is offering $1 draft beers on the weekends, all day long, during the summer months.

Adam Lippin, creator of Atomic Wings, explained the reason for the event: "Buffalo Wings are an iconic symbol of American culture. We’re happy to be partnered with Frank’s RedHot because we use them in our sauces daily. This is a fun event that people can come to and watch the show and eat great wings. As you can see, it is proving to be quite popular."

Atomic Wing sauces range from mild, to medium, to hot, to abusive, to nuclear, and finally, suicidal. Also honey mustard, barbeque and jerk are also on the menu. Out of the 100 sign-ups, 10 finalists were chosen to compete. The objective was to see how many wings they could eat in 8 minutes.

Before the actual contest began, Scott Schneider, Director of Operations, excited the spectators by standing on the top of a ladder and, with bullhorn in hand, threw out promotional items such as beach balls, key chains, chef’s aprons and Frisbees to the people below. As the crowd shouted, "Eat! Eat!" the countdown began.

Buckets of wings were devoured as the contestants ate what they could. The first bucket consisted of 30 wings and the buckets following were filled with 15 wings each. If a contestant did not finish all of the meat on the bone, they would have to do so before the next wing was consumed. Five judges stood behind the contestants as they ate.

The wings that the contestants were eating were donned with the medium sauce. The winners would receive: (1st place) a $150 gift certificate to Atomic Wings, as well as the title of ‘Wing King of New York’; (2nd place) a $35 gift certificate to Atomic Wings; and for 3rd place, a $25 gift certificate.

As the minutes passed, Schneider exclaimed, "It’s all about the meat, not the heat!" as the crowd joined in. The winners were: in 3rd place, Edward Dahlias, 21, from Brooklyn; in 2nd place, Elise Rosenberg, 24, a Community Training Specialist from Manhattan; and the winner, crowned ‘Wing King of NY’ was Sean Lennon, 39, an Iron Worker from Coney Island, Brooklyn, who continued to munch away on wings long after the 8 minutes had ended.

After eating 37 wings during the contest and several more after the contest was over, when asked to comment about the event, winner Sean Lennon said, "I thought the wings were delicious!" 

Atomic Wings opened their newest store on Monday, July 20th, which is located at 172 Newark Avenue in Jersey City, New Jersey.