Real Tennis World Record Attempt - The Training Begins!

Week one of preparations for my forthcoming World Record Attempt has now come to a close!

There hasn't been too much work on my stamina, fitness or tennis yet! I have spent most of the week working on agreeing the World Record to be attempted with Guinness World Records and promoting the event through Facebook and my Sport Relief pages.


I have however been taking advice on how best to prepare, both from Tony at the club and from Lucozade. I now have a plan on what I need to do regarding keeping the tennis going for as long as possible on the day, both from a stamina point of view and from a nutition perspective.


Now the real work begins! I will now try to play as much Real Tennis as I can - the best preparation - gradually increasing continuous time on court, and spend the rest of my free time in the gym or at home building my strength up. Having gone through just an hour with Tony in the gym today sorting out exercises, I realise I have plenty of work to do!

The World Record attempt is agreed!

Well, I have now agreed with Guinness World Records the new record that I will be attempting to set on March 20th/21st 2010. Only 4 Weeks 5 days and 1 hour to go!

The new record category is - Real Tennis, Singles, Most Consecutive Opponents.

I will be playing singles matches of best of three sets, played off handicap for as long as I can. I am led to believe that for the recoprd attempt to be recognised this will have to be in excess of 24 hours. I will receive 5 minutes rest period per whole hour that I play. These rest minutes can be accumulated.

The whole process has to be monitored and a detailed log maintained of everything that happens, with photos, video and written notes signed off by the people doing the monitoring - probably committee members from the club. The log is then submitted to Guinness World Records and they then decide whether or not the record attempt is successful.

Now that this is all set, I can start to line up opponents throughout the period, and to take care of all of the necessary arrangements, PR and fundraising. I will also be training hard by playing as much tennis as I can fit in, as well as by working on my fitnesss and strength in the gym.

The support from the club so far has been amazing, both in terms of sponsorship and time and effort. Big thanks go out to all of you who have helped so far - you know who you are!

Prested Hall Real Tennis Club: Australian Womens Open Championships 2010 - CONGRATULATIONS TO...

...CLAIRE VIGRASS (pictured right) on beating her elder sister SARAH to the Womens Singles title 6/4, 6/3...

...SARAH AND CLAIRE VIGRASS on beating Australian pair Kate Brown and Susan Castley to the Womens Doubles title 6/0, 6/0...

...and to both Vigrass sisters on out-partying the 24-hour party people at the Tournament Dinner!

Further information is given on Hobart Real Tennis Club's http://hobarttennis.com.au/ webpage

24 Hour Real Tennis Marathon at Prested

Will Stephens is to raise money for Sport Relief by attempting to play real tennis for 24 hours non stop!

I had this idea a while back. Now I have pasted it all over Facebook and invited everyone along, so I guess I'll have to do it!

Only 6 weeks or so to train. Oh dear!

I'll be updating this blog regularly to keep you posted on my progress.....if you are interested!

Tonight I am meeting Alix Barfett who is going to apply for the attempt to be recognised by the Guinness Book of World Records. I am also meeting Tony, one of the Personal Trainers at the club. He will be helping me prepare for the event in terms of diet and fitness training.