Meet the gorgeous winner of Japan’s capybara bathing contest

We may have discovered a better match than the famous one “Space Race” The nationwide “Capybara Bath Showdown” held in Shibuya. It lives up to its name: Five zoos across Japan face off to see which capybara champion can soak the longest in an open-air bath. This year’s winner stayed underwater for a staggering 1 hour, 45 minutes and 18 seconds, living up to her iconic name Prune.

This is how the competition works.

Trim by @capybarabath on X

Prune beats legendary rival

Representing the Nagasaki Biopark, Prue has officially won the title of Japan’s most relaxed capybara. However, much of the pre-fight hype centered around her opponent, the Hedge Horse from Saitama Children’s Zoo.

Heqima is already a household name in the niche competition scene, having won four consecutive summer speed-eating contests and is known as the “Watermelon Queen.” This is her second attempt at the winter swimming championship.

The competition was extremely fierce and the battle for the top three spots on the final leaderboard was fierce. Koharu at Nasu Animal Kingdom was right behind Prue with a time of 1 hour, 32 minutes and 17 seconds, while Truffle at Izu Cactus Zoo was behind at 1 hour, 26 minutes and 57 seconds.

Poor Sheeda from Ishikawa Zoo seemed to have other plans as she emerged from the water after just 17 seconds. Despite fans’ high expectations, Heqima finished in a respectable but disappointing fourth place.

hechima by @capybarabath on X

The science of immersion

This year’s competition has major changes to the bath time rules. In previous years, all zoos started their clocks at the same time, but organizers realized this was unfair to capybaras, which have different natural patterns. According to park officials, starting at a different time than typical bathing times is disadvantageous, so each zoo is allowed to start the timing when that particular capybara usually bathes.

For Hechima, that means jumping into a bathtub with warm waterfall water at 2:10 p.m. As she began to nod off, visitors watched from a distance and whispered, “Hang on,” quietly so as not to distract her. Despite these words of encouragement, she did not outlive Prune.

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