A HOLLYWOOD legend joining folk-dancers from Asturias and showing off her fancy footwork in the street is not a scene your average Oviedo resident witnesses during his or her weekly shop. Even though their northern...
‘Toledo Turbo’ holds Spain's most Guinness world records: What, how and why?
21/11/2020
ENTERING the Guinness Book of Records always sounds more glamorous than it is. We imagine those who have achieved it being the fastest person to run X distance in X nanoseconds, to have climbed the highest mountain or building bare-handed, or to have raised the most for charity from a pop concert. Known celebrities who have an entry or two include actor Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson, who holds the record for the most selfies taken in three minutes (105 in total) and for creating the largest layered dip, along with his team, which was then auctioned for the homeless. Justin Bieber and Eminem have broken records through their music sales. Others need no introduction, like the fastest 200-metre Olympic run, in 19.3 seconds (that's you, Usain, in case you were reading this and wondering).
But the Guinness is also full of some very silly ones. Spain has made numerous attempts, successful and otherwise, with the longest turrón (an almond nougat-y confectionery in various guises that pops out of the woodwork just before Christmas – a decade or two back, this meant around December 23, but 20 years into the third millennium, we're now talking about roughly when the Hallowe'en hangover is starting to wear off) or the biggest Roscón de Reyes (a fruity, doughnut-y cake eaten on the public holiday for the Three Kings, or the Epiphany).
Some of the daftest include the longest fingernails (Shridhar Chillal from India, at nine metres, 9.6 centimetres, or roughly two cars in length); most dogs in a Conga line, most Simpsons' tattoos, most Rubik's cubes solved underwater (apparently, Rubik's cubes can actually be solved without peeling off the stickers. That in itself is a pretty fascinating revelation), and even, for fans of the scatological, Bernard Clemmens from London is in the Guinness for the longest continuous episode of flatulence, at two minutes and 42 seconds (for most of us, it would also be followed up with the record for the fastest name change and cross-continental emigration ever).
Spain's busiest 'recordman': Four records in as many minutes
Dr Christián López, a motivational speaker with a PhD in Sports Sciences and instructor at Torrijos municipal sports academy, holds 40 records – or perhaps that should be 41, since he also holds the record for holding the most records of anyone in Spain; or maybe 42, for being the most famous resident in the town of Cabañas de la Sagra in the province of Toledo.
Last July alone, he smashed four in one hit, taking his total to 21, and which he has nearly doubled officially since.
How do you manage to get into the Guinness Book of Records four times in one day, without being Rafael Nadal?
Well, he started off, to the delight of residents in Torrijos (Toledo province) by running backwards down the C/ Manuel Banayas for 100 metres whilst carrying a 27-kilo rucksack (that's basically a rucksack stuffed with four-and-a-half of those supermarket six-packs of milk cartons; the ones everyone breaks up and buys in six different trips to avoid back strain). Achieving it in less than 30 seconds meant that was one down and with plenty of time left to have a crack at another three.
A fan of not looking where he's going, López ran backwards for another 50 metres, this time wearing diver's flippers, in less than 11.44 seconds.
He had to perform both feats twice to take the average and so they could be documented properly in order to be eligible for entry; the rucksack stunt took 23.34 seconds and 23.55 seconds, then the double flipper performance took 9.33 seconds and 9.24 seconds.
For Christián's next two, he opted for forward planning; there's only so much you can do with your back to the crowd, so he had a crack at how many power-walk steps he could squash into a minute. The record, until last July, was 71, but he has now moved the goalpost to 77.
Then he repeated the exercise with a nine-kilo rucksack on, aiming to beat the record of 51 – which he amply cleared, managing 66.
Within less than four minutes in a Toledo village, Christián had sealed his place in his sixth annual edition of the Guinness – having, a year earlier, notched up two entries in the 500th anniversary issue by piling up the most ham on a plate and cutting the most ham in one minute.
What else has Christián been getting up to?
While the rest of Spain spent lockdown trying to get around to redecorating, sorting cupboards or making this the year they finally read Don Quijote de la Mancha from cover to cover, failing miserably and spending it glued to Netflix instead, Christián was parking bikes on his face.
On April 26, he broke David Rush's six-minute, one-second record for balancing a bicycle on his chin, by over 50% - his 13-kilo BH Jumper 760 stayed propped on his jaw, upside-down by the saddle for nine minutes and 41 seconds.
And we couldn't even find the mental energy to repaint the spare room ceiling, even by beating ourselves up about how Shakespeare wrote King Lear during plague quarantine.
In fact, by the time we were coming up to the end of our first two months in lockdown, Christián's Guinness Book of Records entries had reached 15...within a year.
Since May 1, 2019, he had broken world records for: The most consecutive stairs climbed whilst juggling with three items (2,082 – the equivalent of a 64-storey building); most time with an object balanced on his head (one hour, 54 minutes and 53 seconds – no doubt he'll try it again until he breaks the so-near-and-yet-so-far two-hour barrier); fastest 400-metre run backwards whilst juggling with three items (one minute, 48.47 seconds); fastest 200 metres run backwards whilst juggling three objects (48.83 seconds); fastest 100 metres run backwards whilst juggling three objects (20.02 seconds); the fastest 50 metres (yes, you've guessed it) run backwards whilst juggling three objects (11.29 seconds); the fastest 100 metres run whilst balancing a table-tennis ball on a table-tennis racket (14.69 seconds); the ping-pong-ball thing again at 50 metres (7.64 seconds); the fastest 200 metres run backwards (30.99 seconds); the most time standing with an open umbrella balanced on one finger (three hours, 31 minutes and 43 seconds); the most 'star jumps' in an hour (3,744) and the fastest 50 metres hopping backwards (13.65 seconds, although we're not sure on which leg).
His 40th record was broken just three days ago, on Wednesday, November 18 – the fastest mile run in Dutch clogs.
New Yorker Ashrita Furman – currently the man with the most Guinness World Records on earth (and probably trembling in his Dutch clogs after hearing Christián wants his crown for this, too) – managed it in seven minutes and 16 seconds, but the 'Toledo Turbo' undercut this by over half a minute, finishing in six minutes and 45 seconds. Forwards, not backwards, but probably in about 1% of the time it would take the average mere mortal to run a mile in any shoes – and not just in one hit, either.
This October, he scooped up the record for the longest time batting a table-tennis ball (51 minutes).
Christián's total of 40 world records means he now has one-and-a-quarter for every year of his life, but his ultimate goal – that of overtaking Ashrita Furman – is going to take some work; the US-based 'Recordman' holds 226 to date, and doesn't look as though he's going to stop collecting them any time soon.
Umm. Why?
For most of us, one would be enough. Holding more than anyone else in our country would be plenty sufficient. So, why does Christián keep at it? More to the point, why did he even start? Was it, rather like Mount Everest, 'because it was there'?
Athletics is probably an obvious choice of record-busting activity for a young man whose doctoral thesis was in treating obesity through diet and exercise, but he didn't start out life being school track champion; far from it.
Christián was diagnosed with Type I diabetes 20 years ago, aged 12 – the type which is innate rather than acquired, and which tends to be even more life-limiting. He knew from this tender age he would have to look after his general health as much as possible to make sure he kept his condition under wraps, although his diabetes meant he suffered frequent injuries when exercising.
He decided he needed a goal, so started training for the famous 'tower-running' contest on the Costa Blanca: Running up the 924 stairs of the 54-storey Gran Hotel Bali in Benidorm, the highest building in the Comunidad Valenciana.
“I came 18th out of a 100 or so,” he reveals.
“I didn't think that was too bad.”
And although we can't see him, someone accompanies Christián in his every record attempt, stair-climb, run, or other general sporting feat, cheering him on and gently cracking a metaphorical whip at his proverbial with a 'get on with it, son'.
“I do it all in my granddad's memory,” Christián reveals.
Ernesto's death when Christián was very young affected him badly, but his beloved relative powers him through the pages of every edition (seven, now) of the Guinness Book of Records.
“He always talked to me about courage, about how you have to inject courage into everything you do,” Christián remembers, fondly.
Creativity is essential, too: “I like to achieve things that I'd first thought were unthinkable; you're always thinking about what you could do, seeking out new challenges and talents, then you either achieve them or you don't. But like this, I avoid the kind of burnout other sports people who specialise in one area suffer,” he says.
Such imaginative challenges means practically nothing he has garnered global fame for are Olympic disciplines, so he is never going to win medals or stand on a podium listening to the Spanish national anthem for them. But Christián doesn't care.
“It's constant fun, basically,” he says.
Maybe not everyone else's kind of fun to do, but certainly to watch: The record for the fastest marathon run whilst dressed as a clown, the fastest 'cooking' of 60 bathtubs full of gazpacho (chilled tomato and vegetable soup), weaving the world's biggest red carpet, catching the largest bonito (white tuna) fish and the sale of the world's most expensive cheese are some of the others Christián's fellow countrypeople have managed over the years, although when it comes to stair-juggling, table-tennis and bike-balancing or backwards running, the rest of Spain is quite happy to leave it to Christián to put their nation on the map.
Photographs 1 and 3: Encastillalamancha.es
Photographs 4 and 5: Torrijos municipal sports academy, where Christián is an instructor (Deportestorrijos.es)
Photograph 2: Toledodiario.es
Related Topics
ENTERING the Guinness Book of Records always sounds more glamorous than it is. We imagine those who have achieved it being the fastest person to run X distance in X nanoseconds, to have climbed the highest mountain or building bare-handed, or to have raised the most for charity from a pop concert. Known celebrities who have an entry or two include actor Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson, who holds the record for the most selfies taken in three minutes (105 in total) and for creating the largest layered dip, along with his team, which was then auctioned for the homeless. Justin Bieber and Eminem have broken records through their music sales. Others need no introduction, like the fastest 200-metre Olympic run, in 19.3 seconds (that's you, Usain, in case you were reading this and wondering).
But the Guinness is also full of some very silly ones. Spain has made numerous attempts, successful and otherwise, with the longest turrón (an almond nougat-y confectionery in various guises that pops out of the woodwork just before Christmas – a decade or two back, this meant around December 23, but 20 years into the third millennium, we're now talking about roughly when the Hallowe'en hangover is starting to wear off) or the biggest Roscón de Reyes (a fruity, doughnut-y cake eaten on the public holiday for the Three Kings, or the Epiphany).
Some of the daftest include the longest fingernails (Shridhar Chillal from India, at nine metres, 9.6 centimetres, or roughly two cars in length); most dogs in a Conga line, most Simpsons' tattoos, most Rubik's cubes solved underwater (apparently, Rubik's cubes can actually be solved without peeling off the stickers. That in itself is a pretty fascinating revelation), and even, for fans of the scatological, Bernard Clemmens from London is in the Guinness for the longest continuous episode of flatulence, at two minutes and 42 seconds (for most of us, it would also be followed up with the record for the fastest name change and cross-continental emigration ever).
Spain's busiest 'recordman': Four records in as many minutes
Dr Christián López, a motivational speaker with a PhD in Sports Sciences and instructor at Torrijos municipal sports academy, holds 40 records – or perhaps that should be 41, since he also holds the record for holding the most records of anyone in Spain; or maybe 42, for being the most famous resident in the town of Cabañas de la Sagra in the province of Toledo.
Last July alone, he smashed four in one hit, taking his total to 21, and which he has nearly doubled officially since.
How do you manage to get into the Guinness Book of Records four times in one day, without being Rafael Nadal?
Well, he started off, to the delight of residents in Torrijos (Toledo province) by running backwards down the C/ Manuel Banayas for 100 metres whilst carrying a 27-kilo rucksack (that's basically a rucksack stuffed with four-and-a-half of those supermarket six-packs of milk cartons; the ones everyone breaks up and buys in six different trips to avoid back strain). Achieving it in less than 30 seconds meant that was one down and with plenty of time left to have a crack at another three.
A fan of not looking where he's going, López ran backwards for another 50 metres, this time wearing diver's flippers, in less than 11.44 seconds.
He had to perform both feats twice to take the average and so they could be documented properly in order to be eligible for entry; the rucksack stunt took 23.34 seconds and 23.55 seconds, then the double flipper performance took 9.33 seconds and 9.24 seconds.
For Christián's next two, he opted for forward planning; there's only so much you can do with your back to the crowd, so he had a crack at how many power-walk steps he could squash into a minute. The record, until last July, was 71, but he has now moved the goalpost to 77.
Then he repeated the exercise with a nine-kilo rucksack on, aiming to beat the record of 51 – which he amply cleared, managing 66.
Within less than four minutes in a Toledo village, Christián had sealed his place in his sixth annual edition of the Guinness – having, a year earlier, notched up two entries in the 500th anniversary issue by piling up the most ham on a plate and cutting the most ham in one minute.
What else has Christián been getting up to?
While the rest of Spain spent lockdown trying to get around to redecorating, sorting cupboards or making this the year they finally read Don Quijote de la Mancha from cover to cover, failing miserably and spending it glued to Netflix instead, Christián was parking bikes on his face.
On April 26, he broke David Rush's six-minute, one-second record for balancing a bicycle on his chin, by over 50% - his 13-kilo BH Jumper 760 stayed propped on his jaw, upside-down by the saddle for nine minutes and 41 seconds.
And we couldn't even find the mental energy to repaint the spare room ceiling, even by beating ourselves up about how Shakespeare wrote King Lear during plague quarantine.
In fact, by the time we were coming up to the end of our first two months in lockdown, Christián's Guinness Book of Records entries had reached 15...within a year.
Since May 1, 2019, he had broken world records for: The most consecutive stairs climbed whilst juggling with three items (2,082 – the equivalent of a 64-storey building); most time with an object balanced on his head (one hour, 54 minutes and 53 seconds – no doubt he'll try it again until he breaks the so-near-and-yet-so-far two-hour barrier); fastest 400-metre run backwards whilst juggling with three items (one minute, 48.47 seconds); fastest 200 metres run backwards whilst juggling three objects (48.83 seconds); fastest 100 metres run backwards whilst juggling three objects (20.02 seconds); the fastest 50 metres (yes, you've guessed it) run backwards whilst juggling three objects (11.29 seconds); the fastest 100 metres run whilst balancing a table-tennis ball on a table-tennis racket (14.69 seconds); the ping-pong-ball thing again at 50 metres (7.64 seconds); the fastest 200 metres run backwards (30.99 seconds); the most time standing with an open umbrella balanced on one finger (three hours, 31 minutes and 43 seconds); the most 'star jumps' in an hour (3,744) and the fastest 50 metres hopping backwards (13.65 seconds, although we're not sure on which leg).
His 40th record was broken just three days ago, on Wednesday, November 18 – the fastest mile run in Dutch clogs.
New Yorker Ashrita Furman – currently the man with the most Guinness World Records on earth (and probably trembling in his Dutch clogs after hearing Christián wants his crown for this, too) – managed it in seven minutes and 16 seconds, but the 'Toledo Turbo' undercut this by over half a minute, finishing in six minutes and 45 seconds. Forwards, not backwards, but probably in about 1% of the time it would take the average mere mortal to run a mile in any shoes – and not just in one hit, either.
This October, he scooped up the record for the longest time batting a table-tennis ball (51 minutes).
Christián's total of 40 world records means he now has one-and-a-quarter for every year of his life, but his ultimate goal – that of overtaking Ashrita Furman – is going to take some work; the US-based 'Recordman' holds 226 to date, and doesn't look as though he's going to stop collecting them any time soon.
Umm. Why?
For most of us, one would be enough. Holding more than anyone else in our country would be plenty sufficient. So, why does Christián keep at it? More to the point, why did he even start? Was it, rather like Mount Everest, 'because it was there'?
Athletics is probably an obvious choice of record-busting activity for a young man whose doctoral thesis was in treating obesity through diet and exercise, but he didn't start out life being school track champion; far from it.
Christián was diagnosed with Type I diabetes 20 years ago, aged 12 – the type which is innate rather than acquired, and which tends to be even more life-limiting. He knew from this tender age he would have to look after his general health as much as possible to make sure he kept his condition under wraps, although his diabetes meant he suffered frequent injuries when exercising.
He decided he needed a goal, so started training for the famous 'tower-running' contest on the Costa Blanca: Running up the 924 stairs of the 54-storey Gran Hotel Bali in Benidorm, the highest building in the Comunidad Valenciana.
“I came 18th out of a 100 or so,” he reveals.
“I didn't think that was too bad.”
And although we can't see him, someone accompanies Christián in his every record attempt, stair-climb, run, or other general sporting feat, cheering him on and gently cracking a metaphorical whip at his proverbial with a 'get on with it, son'.
“I do it all in my granddad's memory,” Christián reveals.
Ernesto's death when Christián was very young affected him badly, but his beloved relative powers him through the pages of every edition (seven, now) of the Guinness Book of Records.
“He always talked to me about courage, about how you have to inject courage into everything you do,” Christián remembers, fondly.
Creativity is essential, too: “I like to achieve things that I'd first thought were unthinkable; you're always thinking about what you could do, seeking out new challenges and talents, then you either achieve them or you don't. But like this, I avoid the kind of burnout other sports people who specialise in one area suffer,” he says.
Such imaginative challenges means practically nothing he has garnered global fame for are Olympic disciplines, so he is never going to win medals or stand on a podium listening to the Spanish national anthem for them. But Christián doesn't care.
“It's constant fun, basically,” he says.
Maybe not everyone else's kind of fun to do, but certainly to watch: The record for the fastest marathon run whilst dressed as a clown, the fastest 'cooking' of 60 bathtubs full of gazpacho (chilled tomato and vegetable soup), weaving the world's biggest red carpet, catching the largest bonito (white tuna) fish and the sale of the world's most expensive cheese are some of the others Christián's fellow countrypeople have managed over the years, although when it comes to stair-juggling, table-tennis and bike-balancing or backwards running, the rest of Spain is quite happy to leave it to Christián to put their nation on the map.
Photographs 1 and 3: Encastillalamancha.es
Photographs 4 and 5: Torrijos municipal sports academy, where Christián is an instructor (Deportestorrijos.es)
Photograph 2: Toledodiario.es
Related Topics
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