Aug 29, 2003
You have to walk as far as possible while balancing a full, old-fashioned pint glass milk bottle on your head. You can stop to rest or eat but the bottle can never leave your head. You are allowed to adjust the bottle twice an hour.
This is one of my favorite records because you look so silly on the outside (the record was appropriately enough first set by a clown!), while on the inside you are very seriously concentrating on the top of your head. If you get distracted even for a split second the bottle can slip off and the attempt is finished. Over the years, as the record has been broken and rebroken, the distance has increased dramatically, so now it is a test of extreme physical endurance as well as mental one-pointedness.
Aug 29, 2003
This is an intense event because the pogo stick is simply not an efficient mode of transport, although it’s lots of fun.
I first set this record in Antarctica. I was in South America and the Argentinian Air Force graciously allowed me and a couple of friends to hitch a ride there on a military transport plane. We flew into the “white continent” and had 90 minutes to locate and measure a course, break the record (with observers from the base as witnesses) and get back on the plane before it took off. It was C-O-L-D! The spring on the pogo stick froze near the 3/4 mile point but I still managed to crack 18 minutes for the mile. I later overcame the 13 -minute barrier at Iffley Field in Oxford, England where one of my heroes, Roger Bannister, first broke the 4-minute mile. My greatest obstacle there was the summer heat!
Jul 22, 2003
I’ve always been intrigued by Stonehenge but never felt any great compulsion to go there until about a month ago. Suddenly, I was just dying to visit the historic site in England and set a record there, so when the opportunity recently arose, I jumped at the chance. My enthusiasm was only slightly dampened when I heard that Stonehenge can be quite windy at times.
The wind at Stonehenge probably doesn’t concern most people, unless they’re trying to fly a kite (unlikely) or attempting to break the Guinness record for standing on a Swiss ball, which is what I decided to do. I always practice for this record indoors because it’s hard enough to balance on the ball even without any distractions. I knew that balancing outdoors at Stonehenge, in a stiff breeze, would be a constant struggle to adjust to the varying velocity and direction of the wind. Dealing with comments from the stream of tourists would be a further challenge, but somehow it seemed like such a perfect fit- trying to stand on a ball for the longest time next to those massive stones that have been standing in a circle for more than 5,000 years.
