From food, the human body, mass participation, speed to technology, the Guinness World Records has 60,000 entries from all corners of the globe.
CGTN visited the brand’s China headquarters in Beijing, and got a peek inside the world of the “mosts.”
Four criteria to qualify
The Guinness World Records currently has 60,000 entries. /VCG Photo
It’s fairly difficult to set a new record since about 75 percent of applications worldwide are rejected, Marco Frigatti, the organization’s Global Records Senior Vice President and General Manager of Greater China, told CGTN.
There are four main criteria when deciding whether an application qualifies. First, a record has to be measurable in terms of size, height, length, etc. “The most beautiful eyes of my girlfriend would not be accepted because it’s not measurable,” Frigatti told CGTN.
Secondly, a record needs to be provable. Frigatti said that some people claimed that they had the longest dream or found the largest flower, but they have no evidence to prove it.
Every record has to be able to be broken as well to trigger international competition.
Also, a record has to have only one variable. “You can be the tallest man or you can run one hundred meters in the fastest time, but you can’t be the tallest man who runs one hundred meters in the fastest time,” said Frigatti.
Records with Chinese characteristics
Apart from other countries, China is “an increasingly interesting market for us,” Frigatti said. Though the US and the UK currently hold the most official Guinness World Record titles, China “is catching up very quickly.”
“We receive a very good number of applications every year from China, about 2,000 to 2,500 every year. And the number is increasing year on year.”
World's longest noodle made by Xiangnian Food Co. Ltd of China. /Guinness World Records Photo
Frigatti told CGTN that record applications from China are extremely varied, often involving mass participation such as relay competitions during the Dragon Boat Festival, regional food, festivals, and tradition and history.
One of the more interesting records regarding food is the longest noodle, which was made by Xiangnian Food Co. Ltd, from central China's Henan Province, in October 2017.
“It took a lot of study and understanding of how to make one single noodle as the record requires the noodle to be one single piece,” said Frigatti, adding the other two points that made the record more fun were how to capture the single noodle to protect it from being broken up and what to do with it at the end, as the guidelines require that every record involving food has to be consumed.
After over 24 hours of work, the single noodle came out more than 3,000 meters long using nearly 40 kilograms of flour, breaking the Japanese record at 548.7 meters. It was consumed at a home for the elderly at the Double Ninth Festival, which pays respect to senior citizens.
Tourists take photos at the world's largest field of herbaceous peonies in Bozhou, eastern China’s Anhui Province. /Guinness World Records Photo
As a country famous for its traditional medicine, China also holds the record for the world’s largest field of herbaceous peonies, which is used in traditional Chinese medicine. The field is located in Bozhou, eastern China’s Anhui Province, with a total area of nearly 580,000 square meters.
Many Chinese celebrities are also record holders. Xie Na, a female host, holds the records for the most followers on the Chinese social media Weibo and the first one to reach 100 million followers on the platform.
“From records, you can describe the world, you can learn about the culture and about the country,” said Frigatti.
Xie Na, a female host, holds the records for the most followers on the Chinese social media Weibo and the first one to reach 100 million followers on the platform. /VCG Photo
Records shift as technology develops
The content in the book of Guinness World Records has always changed as the world develops and evolves, said Frigatti. As China has been moving very fast in terms of technology, more tech-related applications can be seen.
“China is at the forefront at technology, especially at artificial intelligence. We see it actually replicated in our record breaking and record applications,” said Frigatti. “We have records for robots; for example, robot dancing is one of the records we have achieved in China last year with over 1,000 robots dancing simultaneously.”
“We have records for drones,” he added.
Pomegranate flower, Xi’an’s city flower, formed by the drone fleet in Xi’an, in northwest China’s Shaanxi Province, on April 29, 2018. /EHANG Egret Photo
Click here to watch the performance by a record-breaking fleet of 1,374 drones.
“The digital aspect of record-breaking is very strong in China, everything in China I’ve learned is done online, you know, payments, talking to people, watching TV, everything happens on your phone,” said Frigatti.
“You can see how record breaking is starting to describe the development in technology and also in the digital format.”
