20 Weird Records Set By College Students

By the time you hit college, you know whether you can ever expect to set a world record in track and field, be the youngest Ph.D. in history, or achieve some equally impressive distinction. But take heart: there are all sorts of records out there that require absolutely no special skills to break. These 20 records were broken by college students who proved that all you really need is plenty of time to kill (that’s a big one) and probably a fairly strong pain tolerance.

1. Farthest grape toss and mouth catch:Trevor McDonald is the hero of everyone who ever played with their food. In April, the Bowdoin College freshman broke the world record of throwing a grape 37 feet in the air and catching it in the mouth. After a few practice runs, he successfully launched and caught a small red grape from 39 feet.
2. Longest Barrel of Monkeys chain:Remember that game where you try to link little red, plastic monkeys together? Twenty-six Dartmouth students changed the name of the game recently when they constructed the world’s longest Barrel of Monkeys chain, with 5,990 linked in all.
3. Longest tongue:Chanel Tapper, a 21-year-old college student from California, currently holds the record for longest tongue in the world. Measuring in at 3.8 inches, her tongue is twice as long as average. And yes, fellas, she’s heard all the comments; get your minds out of the gutter.
4. Longest video game marathon playing a first-person shooter:College students would set the record for longest consecutive time playing a video game. In 2011, George Vogl, a senior at Montana State University College of Technology played Battlefield: Bad Company 2 for 51 hours and 21 minutes with his three friends, who had also attended the school.
5. Most champagne corks popped in one minute:You’d think the number would be higher, but Sarah Greasley of Cambridge University set the record of six champagne bottles popped in one minute in 2011. She attempted to beat several other challenges the same day, also setting the record for most sticky notes attached to the body simultaneously: 454.
6. Most people blowing a gum bubble simultaneously:Students at Kirkwood Community College in Iowa got some help from cool faculty members in breaking this record. More than 300 people showed up to a volleyball game on Oct. 27, 2010, to blow a chewing gum bubble at the same time to raise awareness for breast cancer.
7. Longest game of ultimate Frisbee:A Montana State University sophomore was part of a 30-member group that broke the world record for the longest game of ultimate Frisbee: a staggering 80 hours, 15 minutes and 13 seconds. Players subbed in and out every six hours, putting each player’s time on the field at roughly 40 hours.
8. Longest time reading aloud:To raise awareness for reading in the Dominican Republic, five college students took turns reading aloud at a library, rotating every two hours. After they shattered the previous record of 240 hours, they kept going until they hit 365 hours, one for each day of the year.
9. Most rugby tackles made in one hour:If you’re unfamiliar with the sport, rugby is said to be basically American football without pads. So for students from Scots College in Australia to make 4,130 tackles in one hour, it’s pretty impressive. And apparently, all 4,130 tackles were clean, because another 32 were disqualified as illegal hits.
10. Biggest cardboard box castle:In February, BYU students bested Harvard students’ record of building a 566-box castle. The 50-member team braved wind and rowdy kids to successfully form 734 boxes into a castle, complete with turrets and cardboard cannons.
11. Largest functional Rube Goldberg machine:A Rube Goldberg machine accomplishes a simple task like cooking ramen noodles by taking a ridiculous number of steps. Engineering students from Purdue recently created the world’s biggest working Rube Goldberg machine, which takes 300 steps to blow up a balloon.
12. Longest marathon theater performance:The show must go on … and on, and on, and on. In 2006, 13 students at Loyola College in India performed 13 bible stories over the course of 72 hours. One student dropped out before the end, but the rest made it to curtain.
13. Most water rockets launched simultaneously:A week after breaking the record for “largest Zumba class” (with 1,439 participants) in November 2011, students at Teylingen College in the Netherlands sent 443 water rockets flying through the air for a few moments, breaking the world record.
14. Largest snowball:The University of Florida never had a shot at this one. Last winter, 10 University of Massachusetts Dartmouth students packed the world’s largest snowball, measuring 7’4? tall, over 23 feet in circumference, and more than 6,100 pounds.
15. Largest game of Pac-man:In 2004, NYU students created a real-life version of the iconic Pac-Man video game, which they called “Pac-Manhattan.” Students dressed as Pac-Man and the ghosts chased each other around downtown Manhattan city blocks. The event was a passing of the torch from Dutch students who years earlier had re-created Tetris in giant form on the side of a university building.
16. Largest scavenger hunt:With the 25th anniversary of the event, the University of Chicago’s annual scavenger hunt officially became the world’s biggest in 2011. The hunt was organized by students and alums, but the 924 participants included members of the public. So many people came out for the event the organizers had to print more lists, then start turning people away.
17. Largest game of Twister:This is one that gets overturned fairly regularly. In September 2011, participants in an event at the Netherlands’ University of Twente put left hand red and right foot green on a Twister board measuring 170 feet by 140 feet. The previous record holders were University College Dublin students, who stole the title from students at University of Tulsa, Oklahoma.
18. Longest handshake:Talk about awkward. Two brothers at Everest College of Multiple Studies in Nepal currently own the record for longest handshake ever. They started at 1:00 p.m. on Friday and stopped at 7:35 a.m. on Sunday, for a total of 42 hours 35 minutes. We’re guessing they went with forearm bashes to celebrate.
19. Largest toy pistol fight:We should have gone to Washington U. In 2010, students there staged a record-breaking Nerf gun battle, packing 461 students into the Commons and having them fire away at each other. They split into two sides and fired back and forth for the required five minutes needed to make the record official.
20. Longest distance traveled on a Slip and Slide in one hour:Penn State students couldn’t hold on to their 2010 record for most ground covered on a slippery mat in 60 minutes. The University of Oregon now has the bragging rights, thanks to an October 2010 performance of 82,080 feet, or 15.5 miles.