Andrew Lazarchik, the owner of Wildcat Championship Belts, makes a living constructing championship belts, so it should come as no surprise that he also loves the TV show This Old
House, a home improvement program all about construction and craftsmanship.
In fact, he enjoys the show so much that he decided to crown the television show This Old House the Undisputed “How-To” Champions. In January 2020, Wildcat fabricated a title belt –
complete with the This Old House crafted into the main plate – and presented it to the show’s cast in recognition of the program’s 40th anniversary.

“Growing up, the one show other than wrestling that I would watch all the time was This Old House,” said Lazarchik, the owner of Wildcat Championship Belts. “As a teenager and even in college, we’d be sitting around the TV watching Norm Abram putting in a new door frame or resurfacing a floor. I have no ability to do any of it myself, but I enjoyed watching it then, and I still do today.”

In 2019, he learned that This Old House was going on a tour of sorts, with live, in-person appearances. This included a stop at WQED, the PBS station in Pittsburgh, not far from Wildcat in Latrobe, PA. Lazarchik immediately knew he’d be attending.

“Then I got to thinking, they’ve supplied a lot of entertainment to me over the years and they are the first ‘How-To’ TV show and certainly the best. They really are the ‘How-To Champions’, and they deserve a belt,” he said.

Wildcat got to work designing and crafting a custom belt for his favorite show. He then went to the event and presented it to the This Old House TV personalities, Kevin O’Conner and Jenn
Nawada. Not only did they pose for photos with their new title belt, but they also took it back to the This Old House studios, where it is permanently on display in recognition of being the true champion of its industry.

Nathan’s Famous Hot Dog Eating Championship

It’s an iconic annual scene that has become, in many ways, just as much a part of the celebration of our nation’s independence as fireworks and Uncle Sam. Amid the blistering heat of July 4, on the corner of Surf and Stillwell avenues on Coney Island, a champion is crowned. Drenched with water, crumbs, and his own sweat, an elite performer – having just consumed more hot dogs in 10 minutes than any other human on the planet – slings a title belt over his shoulder.

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The Nathan’s Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest is held each year on the Fourth of July and is broadcast nationally on ESPN. The world’s most skilled competitive eaters gather to compete for fame, prize money, and a highly sought-after, mustard yellow belt. In 2020, Joey Chestnut set a
world record when he housed 75 hot dogs and buns, before hoisting the belt in victory. That belt, created by Wildcat Championship Belts, is now an iconic symbol of competitive eating, the Nathan’s contest and, in some ways, even Independence Day itself. It’s essentially the Lombardi Trophy of the competitive eating world.

“Nathan’s was my first really big account,” said Andrew Lazarchik, owner of Wildcat Championship Belts. “We had them as an account even before we had WWE.” Lazarchik founded Wildcat Championship Belts in May 2005. About a year later, he got a call from Ray Kuchinka, a friend who was watching the 2006 installment of Nathan’s Famous Hot Dog Eating contest. At that time, Nathan’s was presenting the champion with a homemade title belt that was essentially a bedazzled weightlifting belt.

“Ray called me and said, ‘I’m watching the Nathan’s Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest, and the belt they give to the winner, well, you could do something so much better,’” Lazarchik recalled.

As coincidence would have it, Lazarchik was watching the Food Network the very next day when Nathan’s Famous Hot Dogs President Wayne Norbitz came on as a guest. That nudged Lazarchik to pursue the idea. He found the company’s address, sent them a letter and some photos of his
work, and offered to create a belt more worthy of a world champion.

Initially, Nathan’s sent Lazarchik a “thanks but no thanks” letter. However, on June 24 of the next year, things changed in a hurry.

“I got a frantic phone call from Major League Eating,” recalled Lazarchik. “The current champion at the time, Takeru Kobayashi, had somehow lost the belt over in Japan. Nathan’s contest was in
less than two weeks, and they didn’t have a belt. They asked me, ‘Can you do something for us
that quickly?’

“It was one of those ‘when opportunity knocks’ situations … I said, ‘Yes, I can do that.’ Then I hung up the phone and said to myself, ‘OK, now I have to figure out how to do this.’”

Wildcat Belts worked feverishly and completed the belt by July 2. They had it shipped to New York City in time for the contest, meaning it was a Wildcat Belts’ creation that was awarded to Joey
Chestnut when he won the 2007 championship.

Nathan’s wanted that initial title to look somewhat like their old belt. So Lazarchik crafted it to be the same shape as the previous belt, with one center plate, the MLE logo, the Nathan’s logo, and ‘1916’ engraved in Roman Numerals, commemorating the year the contest started.

Now, Wildcat makes a new belt for the contest every year. In 2010, MLE launched a female division, and Wildcat began creating pink women’s title belts, as well.

In 2016, when Nathan’s Famous celebrated its 100 Year Anniversary, the belt design was upgraded to more of a
traditional title belt style, with four side plates and artwork featuring Uncle Sam holding a hot dog.

Securing Nathan’s as a client was a major break in Wildcat’s emergence. “It’s one of these things where it gave us a lot of credibility,” said Lazarchik. “It wasn’t so much that people would see it on TV and then call me saying they wanted a belt, but when I would call people and tell them ‘we make the belts for the Nathan’s Famous Hot Dog Eating contest,’ and people would say, ‘Oh wow, these guys are legit.’ It took our business to a whole other level.”

When Andrew Lazarchik founded Wildcat Championship Belts, he envisioned the belts he created would be for, well, wrestling. Through the years, that has evolved. Sure, they still make title belts for wrestling companies across the globe, up to and including the WWE, but he also makes them for corporate sales teams, competitive eating contests, and community festivals.

But, there’s one category that means a little more than the rest. Lazarchik and Wildcat have created and donated professional-quality belts to terminally ill children.

“Those are the belts that mean the most,” he said. The connection is through David Alan Clothing, a high-end, Pittsburgh-based men’s clothing designer. Several high-profile WWE personalities – including John Cena, The New Day, and Titus O’Neil – are among his clientele.

Each year in Pittsburgh, David Alan Fashion presents a celebrity fashion show, featuring his star athletes wearing his custom clothing. Given Alan’s connection with WWE, partnering with Wildcat Belts was a natural fit.

“There was a natural tie-in. I’m a Pittsburgh guy who does a lot of work for the WWE, and then I heard that the guy who makes the belts for WWE is a Pittsburgh guy too,” said Alan. “So I reached out. It just made sense.”

Alan reached out to Wildcat in 2018, and Lazarchik jumped at the chance to get involved. He crafted and donated a championship belt, which was auctioned off to support charities that help children in need.

The following year, Wildcat again donated a belt for the auction and also crafted title belts to be given directly to ill children. For any young wrestling fan, wearing a title belt fabricated by the company that actually makes the belts for WWE is quite a thrill.

“It’s always good to pay it forward,” said Lazarchik. “When I was a kid, to have an adult do something special for me, it made such an impact. If this is something Wildcat can do to help kids have a brighter day, that’s something we always want to do.”