20 Years Later, the Sausages Still Rule

Today marks the 20th anniversary of the first live-action race of the Klements Famous Racing Sausages. Before that fateful day in 1993, the participants were an on-again, off-again scoreboard feature meant as a clever way to tie the official sausage of the Milwaukee Brewers with the in-game experience. Besides eating them, of course.

Today the sausages begin the next 20 years of dominance in the mascot racing world. (Jeff Hanisch-USA TODAY Sports)

Since then, the Hot Dog, Bratwurst, Polish, Italian, and Chorizo have become fixtures at Miller Park and a Wisconsin Institution. They are the longest-running mascot race in professional sports and, to our knowledge, the most famous anthropomorphic smoked meat products in the world.

Here are some quick fun facts about the sausages, so you can know the reigning champions of racing mascots a little better.

• The first ever live-action sausage race was won by Bratwurst. Always bet on Bratwurst.
• The sausages have names: Chorizo is Cinco, Italian is Guido, Bratwurst is Brett Wurst, Polish goes by Stosh, and the Hot Dog is named Frankie Furter
• So far, the Italian Sausage is the only known sausage-napping victim in the United States, though it is thought thousands of events go unreported annually
• Currently, the Italian Sausage and Chorizo are tied with 10 wins apiece, Brat and Polish have nine, and Hot Dog is lagging behind with only 2 victories

As their popularity continues to grow, they have been imitated several times over. While they are certainly rivaled by some organizations, there’s no question that the sausage race is unparalleled in its greatness. With that in mind, we take some time off from covering baseball to breakdown why no other mascot race can beat out the Sausages.