All posts by davidrush@gmail.com

Juggling, World Records

World’s Fastest Man***

Over 6,000 miles and hundreds of training runs later, I can now claim to be the world’s fastest man***

***while juggling blindfolded.

Usain Bolt, nor any other person on the face of the planet can claim to run the 100m dash faster than me while juggling blindfolded. I completed the distance in 16.29 seconds beating the Guinness minimum mark of 20 seconds. (I didn’t create this record, but no one has ever been able to break it).

I broke this record to celebrate Guinness World Record’s Day 2021 (celebrated Nov. 17). I had 3 records featured in the official Guinness Video starting at 15:50 including last week’s record for most consecutive axe juggling catches and this one.

But I’ve been trying to break this record since I first applied for it in August of 2017. I’ve made other official attempts at it with the team but I was never able to complete the 100 meters with my eyes blindfolded while staying in my lane. Yes, Guinness World Records requires the participant to stay in the lane.

I have the record for the fastest mile run while juggling blindfolded (which I also can’t really believe I broke) but I didn’t have to stay in my lane for that one. While breaking it, I completed a 1/3 mile stretch without dropping a ball (drops were allowed and I made 10, but you had to go back to where you dropped it, don the blindfold, and start again). Running 100 meters juggling blindfolded is well within my skill range.

For the 100 meter dash, the main challenge for me was staying in my lane. The other impossible part of it is accelerating quickly since I have to throw the balls forward and catch up to them. Running at a constant speed isn’t nearly as hard since I just juggle normal and the balls and body are moving at the same speed relative to each other. I did lots of sprint starts juggling with my eyes closed to prepare for this one.

It took 22 fails but I finally completed the 100 meters juggling while staying in my lane. But as we were collecting evidence I discovered that all 6 videographers had shut off their cameras after the run was complete. Guinness requires all evidence to be gathered on one continuous shot. I may have been able to make a case since the blindfold was inspected before the run but the measuring on the lane width was on a separate shot. (I was allowed to increase the width to 48 inches per IAAF rules since the high school track I was using only had 40-inch lanes, and I needed the extra 8 inches!

What’re a few more tries after over 6,000 miles of training? After a few more attempts, my goal of over 5 years was complete with a run of 16.29 seconds!

I ran my first juggling half marathon after 2 practice runs and in 2005 my juggling career began. 7 years later I started tracking my runs with RunKeeper.

What kid didn’t watch the Olympics growing up dreaming of being the fastest man in the world? I found a way, even if I did have to make it the most niche category there is?

Juggling, World Records

Axe Juggling World Record

Happy Guinness World Records Day 2017! November 17th is the special day and I have two exciting records to celebrate. This week I reclaim the record for most consecutive axe juggling catches and next week I break a record no one has ever been able to break before and is quite possibly the hardest record I have ever broken. Be sure to check back next Sunday!

Last time I broke this record I got 839 consecutive catches at the X-games in Boise over 3 years ago. The record stood at 937 catches but this time but I didn’t just want to break it this time, I wanted to crush it.

After months of practice, including going on joggling runs with tennis balls filled with pennies, juggling bowling balls, and lots of curls with dumbbells, I was finally ready to take back the record. It took several official attempts over several days because once I dropped an axe after a long run, I was pretty much done for the day since it took so much out of me.

I juggled for 21 minutes 11 seconds and achieved 2,919 consecutive catches before I finally dropped an axe. I had several nicks on my hands that were bleeding by the end since I was juggling without much margin for error to conserve strength, but the most painful part of this attempt was hitting my knee caps with the axes. I chose to wear pants so fortunately, they didn’t cut me but the bruises hurt. I was pretty thrilled to be able to keep nearly 10 pounds in the air for over 21 minutes since these axes are almost 3 times the weight of the typical hatchet but just over the Guinness World Records minimum weight.

World Records

Easy as Making Bloody Apple Pie

Who would guess that this record attempt would result in more bleeding than 98% of all my record attempts?

It also made practicing highly unpleasant and short-lived. Fortunately, we could also practice with other objects like marshmallows. Every time an apple hit me just on the side of the mouth from 15 feet away, it would smash my lips into my teeth. I would either get cut by my incisors or bicuspids or sometimes the inside of my mouth would be smashed between my front teeth so hard it wouldn’t come out without floss. Either way, I was left and bruised and bloodied mess after every practice and the final (fortunately successful) attempt.

The record was for the most apples caught in the mouth in one minute. No size was specified for the apples so I drove around Boise until we found an apple tree in someone’s front yard with small apples. We knocked and asked if we could pick some, and since they weren’t edible, they were more than happy for us to take them.

Jonathan threw 60 apples in the minute and despite missing the first one, we had a strong streak for the next 50 seconds before ending a little weak to catch 49 of them in the mouth in one minute beating the previous record of 47 by two.

World Records

Team Pass

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I’m really excited about this record. Not because it’s particularly special by itself but because it’s my brother’s first Guinness World Record! My brother Jonathan has been an inspiration to me since I was a kid. He’s a year older and was always beating me at every sport we ever played in our childhood. He was also kind and gracious in victory (much more so than I ever was, but maybe that’s because I hardly ever won…). I write about our relationship in the opening of my book: Breaking Records: 21 Lessons from 21 Record Attempts

https://youtu.be/JHvHVLW1nuo

We teamed up with another first-time record-breaker Jon Morse to tackle the record for the most giant beach ball passes in 3 minutes.

The previous record was 345. We practiced, figured out the best technique (the teams could be up to 25 people but the minimum size of 3 appears to be much faster if you have the stamina), and we went at it several times. In the end, we nearly doubled the previous record with 673 passes in 3 minutes and Guinnes just approved the record this last week.

World Records

Fastest Half Marathon Cue Balance

I did break a Guinness World Record this last week but I’m not ready to publish the video yet so I’m doing a throwback to never-before-seen footage of my 50th Guinness World Record for the fastest half marathon balancing a pool cue on the finger.

The MC announced at the beginning of the race some of the exciting marks being attempted at the race. There was one gal attempting her 33rd half marathon. She was 11… . Then there was the man attempting his 100th marathon.

It was a chilly morning in the 50s and felt colder with a strong, gusty wind. There was a false start countdown at 7 AM when the race was supposed to start since there were 2 busses of runners that hadn’t yet arrived. Fifteen minutes later the race began for real. I waited until the 1,100 runners from the half and full marathon all crossed the start line and then waited another minute and a half to start so the crowd could spread out before I needed to start passing them. I had to pass over 700 runners during the race but I still think it’s easier to weave through them during the race than fight with so many at the beginning and risk a serious pileup/injuty at the beginning.

I took off at about 7:16 AM and immediately ran into trouble. Gusts of over 35 MPH hit me from the side and it was all I could do to stretch my right hand all the way over to the left side of my body and have the cue lean right into the wind. I made it several steps but then lost the handle and the cue fell off. I slowed, retraced my steps, rebalanced the cue and took off again. Less than a minute later another strong gust knocked the cue off and the process repeated. In all I would lose the balance or hit a tree well over a dozen times and have to go back to restart where the incident occurred.

My splits were about 8:15-8:30 for the first 6 miles, then 9:30 for the 7th since I stopped for food and had a camera malfunction that took some time. I finished at sub 7:30 pace for the last 3 miles.

My finishing chip time was: 1:49:37. I broke my stretch goal of sub 1:50.

Jeremy was not so sure about a giant walking potato…

Big shout out to Patrick Harper and Kevin Everett who accompanied me the whole way as official witnesses and videographers. They were extremely helpful not only for making the record attempt official but letting me know about low-hanging tree branches (and especially the time I hit some pine needles I didn’t feel).

Juggling, World Records

Blind Balance Speed Juggle

One question I’m often asked after breaking over 200 Guinness World Records is how I make them all up. I usually don’t. The vast majority were existing records broken by other people that I found through YouTube videos, the Guinness World records book, and the Guinness World Records website.

This record is the exception. Other than after I set the inaugural mark 3 years ago, however, it has been broken twice and I had to take it back.

The record is for the most consecutive juggling catches while balancing on a roller board. The minimum mark for Guinness to recognize it when I broke it 3 years ago was 15 catches. I got 52 and celebrated. Then it was broken by a professional juggler at a Guinness event with 74 catches. This last year Brenden Kelbie out of Australia got 159 consecutive catches tripling my initial mark.

There are few things I claim to be the best at, but 3 ball blind juggling is one of them. I have the records for longest duration blind juggling, fastest blind juggling (most catches in one minute), and the fastest mile run while juggling blind. Taking back the record for the roller board was surely within reach.

The hard part for me isn’t the blind juggling or balancing on a roller board, it’s the blind balance. I don’t think it matters if I’m juggling or not; balancing on the roller board while blind is just as hard.

After months of practice training my balance not to be reliant on vision just as my juggling doesn’t rely on vision, I was able to remain balanced for 3 minutes 19 seconds. To make the most out of those 3+ minutes I decided to speed juggle making over 6.6 catches per second. This was a most catches record and not a time duration record. 1,316 catches later, I nearly broke this record by an order of magnitude. Good luck to the challengers!

World Records

Close Shave

Records are made to be broken. Most table tennis balls caught in shaving foam on the head in 30 seconds is one of them. Jonathan “Hollywood” Hannon and I had a hard time trying to break this record the first time when it stood at 21. We practiced, got rules clarifications, and finally got 29.

A few months later our record was broken with a run of 32. We’d spent enough time practicing and working on the strategy that we had to defend this one. I spent a few weeks practicing throwing close to 60 table tennis balls from one hand into a target in 30 seconds. It’s harder than you might think to reload quickly and then only let one ball go at a time. I also spent 10 times as much time sculpting the shaving foam on Jonathan’s head as I did on the 30 seconds throwing the balls to stick on his head. The effort paid off and we have reclaimed this record as ours with 35 table tennis balls stuck on the head in shaving foam in 30 seconds.

World Records

A Marshmallow a Second

I’ll be honest – I wasn’t sure we were going to break this one. Marshmallows have a useful life-and when we’re going through 60+ per attempt, there are only so many attempts you can make before you run out of marshmallows.

The previous record for the most marshmallows caught in the mouth in one minute (team of 2) was 56. This record has been broken several times through the years since I first applied for it: YouTube star Josh Horton, Japan team on Guinness TV, serial record breaker Ashrita Furman (current holder). I think when I first saw the record it was in the low 40s. Even then it was a stretch to think we could break it which is why it’s been on the back-burner for so long.

After several attempts from 15 feet away, our marshmallow supply was dwindling. Jonathan “Hollywood” Hannon stepped up to the plate and delivered an on-target throwing performance getting 63 marshmallows launched toward my face and we only missed 5 of them in the one minute for a final result of 58 marshmallows caught in one minute.

Juggling, World Records

Catching Double

I consider myself a juggler. I’m certainly not the best juggler but there are few things I’m better at than juggling. After countless hours of practice, I have also acquired a number of skills that fit into the category of “stupid human tricks” that are useful for little other than entertaining myself and others. One of those skills is catching things in my mouth. For this record, I combine the two skills of juggling and catching things in my mouth.

The Guinness World Records title is for the most grapes caught in the mouth in one minute while juggling. The record when we attempted this stood officially at 27. Before this was approved another team got 32. My neighbor, Jonathan “Hollywood” Hannon was again my thrower and while juggling 3 balls for the full minute with no drops or stops I was able to catch 35 grapes in my mouth.

I was expecting this record to be easier than it was. It took a while not to move my hands out of position while my head darted back and forth catching grapes. Once I was able to separate the movement of my head and hands, it made breaking this record possible. I think we’ll probably have to defend this record soon but we’re sure we can extend it even further.

World Records

Moving Water

It took longer to find a container that met all the Guinness specifications than it did to practice to break this record. That’s not to say it didn’t take practice, it’s just hard to find a container large enough with a small enough opening to be able to break the record.

The previous mark was 2600ml of water moved with the hands in 30 seconds. I was able t get 3375ml from one container to the other in the allotted time.

I measured it 3 different ways: 1) with the markings on the final container itself (but these weren’t granular enough) 2) by weighing the container after carefully drying off the outside and subtracting the weight of the empty container. Did you know that the relationship between 1g of water and 1ml of water is exactly 1:1 (it’s not a coincidence) and 3) I poured the water from this container into one that had more granular markings. They were all pretty close but I used the smallest of them to be safe.