The burger is usually served with a five-pound plate of fries, although the competitors were not required to eat them.

Sitting down to the table, Walker said he thought his biggest threat would come from the Northeastern eater to his right, a 300-pound lineman on the football team.

“He was big but he didn’t have his heart in it,” Walker said. “When we started eating I knew I was in good shape.”

Walker didn’t know that a rugby player from Boston College had pulled ahead, and was wolfing down hamburger patties at almost twice Walker’s rate.

Walker’s friends warned him of the threat, and he began to catch up.

“I was in the zone,” Walker said. “I could barely notice anything around me.”

He seized the patties, two at a time, quickening in speed and resolve. By the time he had reached the last patty, he said the eating had gotten easier. He stuffed down the last morsels of meat and threw his hand in the air.

“It came down to the wire,” said Jack J. Sadule ’03, a friend of Walker’s who was present, “He won by about two bites.”

Walker’s friends assert that he has always been a gifted eater.

Palazzo said Walker regularly wins eating contests in the Adams House Dining Hall.

“He always beats us,” he said. “Sometimes he does the saltine cracker thing––you know, six in a minute. It doesn’t seem hard but it’s impossible. Ian’s the only guy I know who can do it.”

Aruda said the Eagle Deli Restaurant is in the process of renaming its burger, and would consider using Walker’s name.

Walker said he had to take a three hour nap to recover from the contest.