Ryan Lewis knows a thing or two about making hits -- you might've heard of his work with Macklemore on The Heist -- so it's no surprise that he was tapped to select the next big producer, during the Buffalo Beat Battle contest held in New York City this week.

The event, co-hosted by Lewis and Buffalo David Bitton, featured 12 contestants going head-to-head in a few rounds, with only one man left standing in the end. The winning prize? $5,000 and some social media love from Lewis, who says that he participated in a couple of beat battle contests when he was younger.

"Growing up as a producer, the beat battle is that thing that pops up every year and it's a really cool opportunity for producers," he told MTV News.

"So I tried to get 12 people and do the structure of the classic beat battle like I did when I was a kid. Buffalo was the perfect brand to collaborate with, because they're incredible and I've had a long term relationship with them, going back to producing tour videos."

Lewis did admit, though, that he was never able to pull off a win in one of these competitions.

"Most beat battles fall into the game of face-scrunching beats," he said. "You only get like 30-45 seconds, so usually you're just trying to play your hardest beats. Because I'm not a hard beat maker -- those are the people who do phenomenal at these things -- I can absolutely murder a round, but you have to go like four or five rounds, and by round two or three I'd start playing some slow jam and it would be over."

It's safe to say that Lewis made it just fine without crushing those beat battle contests. On Wednesday he crowned Jonathon Eley as the big winner.