What to Know
- Radio station 94 WIP ended Wing Bowl after 26 years.
- The annual chicken wing-eating competition drew thousands of fans to the Wells Fargo Center on Super Bowl weekend.
- The event of excess was known for drunken exploits, scantily-clad Wingettes and chicken wings.
There is an empty space in Philadelphia's collective stomach this Friday morning.
There is no Wing Bowl, the City of Brotherly Love’s annual Super Bowl weekend celebration of excess, this year.
Wing Bowl founders and 94 WIP morning hosts Angelo Cataldi and Al Morganti put Wing Bowl to rest in October.
“Wing Bowl, after 26 years, is being put to rest,” an emotional Cataldi said.
Station reps cited the Eagles winning the Super Bowl, which happened just days after the final Wing Bowl, as the reason for ending the annual chicken wing-eating competition.
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In the #MeToo era, the event was a relic. Wing Bowl, held early in the morning on the Friday before the Super Bowl, was known as much for its outlandish, and at times politically incorrect, entrances and scantily clad Wingettes as it was for chicken wing eating. Fans would start tailgating in the pitch dark before the event began at 6 a.m.
Wing Bowl 20 in Photos
The first Wing Bowl was held in a hotel lobby. The event quickly grew to packing the Wells Fargo Center with thousands of (sometimes drunken) fans each winter and even becoming a ticketed event.
Over the years, celebrities from Snooki to Jon Bon Jovi took part in the festivities as the organizers looked to make each year bigger and better.
Molly Schuyler downed 501 wings to set the record at last year's final Wing Bowl.
