March 17 was Saint Patrick’s Day, and in honor of this holiday the Fiery Leprechaun Challenge took place for the 6th year consecutively. The Fiery Leprechaun Challenge is like the show Hot Ones held in the Johnson Fieldhouse. The goal is to eat the most chicken wings covered in hot sauce with time increments between each wing, and as the spice level rises the ‘burn’ time increases. In the end, whoever can endure the spice levels without anything to drink wins the challenge, and multiple people can win.
“I have only participated in Fiery Leprechaun challenge once, and it was the very first year they had ever done it. I will definitely never forget how intense it really was, and how could I forget hot sauce number eight, it was exponentially hot on the Scoville Scale, ” said faculty member Charles Steeves.
There were ten different hot sauces that were served to the participants in the event. Each different hot sauce was measured on the Scoville Scale, which is a measurement system for the spiciness, or “heat,” of chili peppers, recorded in Scoville Heat Units. With each advancing round the hot sauce became significantly more hot and spicy. The participants try their hardest to not intake any water because it actually expands the taste buds and heat. This was very challenging because with the higher the Scoville Scale, the more burn time, or wait time, the participants had to sit through.
“This was my first year doing the event, although I watched it last year and I thought that it looked super fun so this year I tried to persist. Although I went out on the eighth hot sauce which actually felt like a bomb, I am pretty sure that it was named something similar. A lot of people ended on the eighth hot sauce, it was significantly more hot compared to number seven,” said sophomore Leila Lim.
As their were many winners that made it through all ten of the rounds, many students dropped out on the eighth hot sauce. Some people even said that the side effects from the different sauces, especially the ones above number seven, made many people feel nauseous, dizzy and even left ears ringing.
“I was one of the winners on Friday. My brother kind of convinced me to compete in it, which I was nervous, although I pushed through and after I got to number eight I figured that I came this far and I might as well just keep going,” said freshman Reese Craig. “The hardest part was definitely at the end when the burn time was four minutes long although it was honestly very rewarding to finish.”