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Just a few weeks after confirmation that five seconds has been shaved off of Geoff & Neils time, confirmation came through of an even faster time. On the 26th September 2006, Håkan Wolgé and Lars Andersson from Sweden set a new time of 18 hours 25 minutes and 3 seconds - putting a healthy gap of around ten minutes off the two previous record times. This was confirmed by Guinness World Records just a few weeks later in November. A complete write up by Håkan can be found on his site here.
On 30th May 2006, Steve Wilson and Samantha Cawley beat Geoff and Neils record ... by just FIVE seconds! They too started at Amersham and finished at Upminster in a time of 18 hours, 35 minutes and 38 seconds - making them the new world record holders. It took Guinness almost four months until the 12th September 2006 to confirm it though! It was Steves third full attempt at the record and Sams second - although they both took part in Tube Relief attempt the previous year. Their account of the day is on their webpages here.
Zone1 Challenge 2006 The 2006 Zone 1 only alternative challenge took place on Friday May 29th 2006, and despite part of the Victoria line being DOWN during the attempt, some people did manage to finish! The full writeup, times, and finishing positions of the teams are here.  "Not
Afraid" Charity Run (Tube 9)In the wake of the terrorist attacks in London on the 7th July 2005, we organised a mass-participation tube challenge event with over 60 people taking part. It has it's own website at www.tuberelief.co.uk. It was not a proper record attempt, but an act of solidarity and defiance to say and show that we are not afraid. We also raised many thousands of pounds towards the official charity for the victims and families of those affected in the tragedy Geoff's personal account of the day of him and his team is here. Zone1 Challenge 2005 This years Zone 1 only alternative challenge took place on Friday May 20th 2005.
Guinness Confirm new rules for Terminal 4 Guinness World Records finally got back to me to deliver the news: You DO have to do Heathrow Terminal 4, which I think is bizarre - but great news for me & Neil personally speaking, as it will make it harder for anyone else to beat our time.
Go to the rules page here to see the latest version. 'Africamp' Charity
Run - Tube
8 Heathrow 4 closed on January 7th for at least 18 months whilst they build a new station at Heathrow Terminal 5. That means that technically the record for 275 stations is 'frozen', and whilst the tube network is now at 274 stations, the record is 'up for grabs' again. Of course, that's what it should be, but Guinness are being a bit weird about it, and so just in case they don't confirm any times whilst the network is in this configuration, we're having a run in aid of charity, and are looking for people to sponsor us. With the announcement from Guinness that we officially have the world record, I decided to drum a bit of media attention to see if we could get in the papers. It worked far better than I might
have hoped for - as Neil and Geoff turned into 'media
whores'! 'Zone 1 only'
- Challenge Day 2004 We had a crack at doing the alternative challenge of just doing all the stations within Zone 1 in the shortest time possible. The current unofficial 'record' at the time was 3 hours and 16 minutes.'r , so several teams took part - all starting at Vauxhall station to try and beat this time. Read about what happened on the first Zone 1 challenge here.
Be my lucky number
seven! - Tube 7
Tube7 happened on
Wednesday May 5th 2004, and look at that time! On 22nd September 2004, Guinness World Records confirmed this as the new record time.
The TV programme that follows Tube 4 was broadcast on ITV1 on Thursday October 16th.
You know that Sneakerpimps song "6 Underground" , yes? Well that's us! Or just me again, as attempt number six was another solo effort which didn't go entirely to plan. You'd think I'd be getting bored of this by now, wouldn't you?
I confessed to getting a bit obsessed by this stage. We (Well, ok - just me by myself!), had a fifth attempt. Want to know what happened? Of course you do, so go and click on the link for Tube5. Metroland Tube
: "Race Around the Underground"
- Tube 4 We were close with our previous attempt, but not close enough for the world record. Which meant another attempt had to happen. I thought the TV/media thing from Tube 3 would be a one off thing, but another TV producer got in touch with me before and in time to record our fourth attempt - one of six programmes in the 'Metroland'.
The Tube - On
TV! : ""24 Hours" - Tube
3
I wasn't actually planning on doing it again until the spring of the following year, but the prospect of getting on the telly made me re-think my schedule when a production company got in touch and asked if they could film me attempting it as part of a series of programmes called 'The Tube'.
When it came to be on TV in January of 2003, I then got in the press quite a lot and had a week of media fun! But No World Record So for a couple of weeks we thought we had broken the world record. I sent all my details off to Guinness, ad sat back smugly telling everyone I knew that I'd done it, and just waited for it to be officially confirmed ... only to have a chap called Jack Welsby to get in touch to tell me that he'd done it faster ...
As the first attempt missed out on three stations, a couple of months later on June 27th I tried it again. This time there were just two us, and we did do all 275 stations! 'Tube 2' it was christened.
So my first crack at doing this then was on 17th May 2001, and we dubbed it 'Tube 1'. Five of us attempted it, we all got sponsored for charity (Cancer Research) so that if we didn't break the record, we'd still make money for charity. Read about what happened on the day! In the beginning
Well, back in September of 2001 was when I first read a book called 'Tunnel Vision', a novel about a guy that attempts to travel around the entire London Underground on the day before his wedding. I'd known about the challenge to do this before, and remember reading about attempts to do it before, but reading this book finally inspired me to have a crack at it myself. So I roped in the assistance of a few friends of mine, and planned to do it in the new year - May of 2002. I thought at the time, that it would be 'quite easy' to do - and perhaps only need to do it the once. No way did I envisage at the time just quite how obsessed one could become with it ... :: Tube Homepage :: Geofftech Homepage :: Geoff's iBlog |
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World
Record Beaten - By 5 seconds!
Media
Whores
Six
Underground
And
then I did it again!
The
first attempt
So
how and when did this all start?
