Sonoma County celebrity chef Guy Fieri had a slip-and-fall mishap recently that landed him in emergency surgery, and his recovery period will probably throw a wrench in his many TV hosting gigs.

Currently airing on the Food Network is Tournament of Champions: All Star Christmas, in which the channel's stable of known chef-competitors is competing in teams to make both savory and sweet dishes in a bracket-based tournament — like the annual Tournament of Champions that is heading into its seventh year. Guy Fieri is hosting, as he does a handful of shows both current and in reruns on the networ, and appears able-bodied.

But this was all shot months ago, and in real life, Fieri was in the middle of shooting a new show, Flavortown Food Fight, when he suffered a serious injury. It's not clear on what date the fall occurred, but Fieri told Fox News Digital last week that his doctor had never seen an injury to the quad muscle this severe.

"He hasn't seen a tear in the biggest, thickest part of your quad in half," Fieri tells Fox News.

The incident happened on some stairs, Fieri says. "I slipped down a set of steps and one foot went forward and the other foot got caught on the threshold. So, you know, it extended me out," he explained to Fox News. "I looked like I was probably doing the splits," he added, saying "my right leg compressed into itself" and the quad muscle tore in the middle.

"You normally tear that muscle at your tendon or the tendon tears off the bone, but this was right in the center of the whole quad muscle and it exploded," Fieri said.

Emergency surgery followed, and now there will be a long recovery, he says.

Fieri was confined to a wheelchair, directing sons Hunter and Ryder and nephew Jules to cook the family's Thanksgiving at his ranch in Windsor this year. And he says he's been told to keep weight off the leg for eight week, after which there will be physical therapy.

Fieri says they were still able to continue or complete shooting Flavortown Food Fight. "We've got everybody in town and all the chefs there and 125 people on set – and everybody's ready to go – and I'm in surgery," Fieri tells Fox News. "So, we figured out how to pivot through it and to have some creative filming techniques."

The new show, which had originally been called Guy's Flavortown Games when it was announced in May, involves a mock "restaurant row" in the fictional Flavortown, in which chefs get to "choose their own adventure" as they compete in terms of restaurant styles and dishes.

The goal for each chef, per the announcement, is "to prove they have the cooking cred to prepare a winning dish in any type of kitchen imaginable — from an awesome smashburger in the cramped food truck to a Michelin-worthy dinner in the state-of-the-art kitchen of a fine dining restaurant." It was scheduled to premiere in early 2026 on Food Network nd HBO Max.

It's not clear if Fieri's injury will impact the shooting of the seventh season of Tournament of Champions, which is shot in a studio in Santa Rosa. The show would typically be shot in the winter months, with a premiere date of the "qualifier" rounds in early March.

Top image: Guy Fieri attends day 2 of Stagecoach Festival on April 26, 2025 in Indio, California. (Photo by Scott Dudelson/Getty Images for Stagecoach)