The best Guinness World Records held in Warrington

It doesn't have to be athletic, sporting, or even particularly academic - there is a Guinness World Record out there for most categories you can think of.

Taking a look at Guinness' own records, there are a number of records that have been broken, or set, in Warrington, or by Warrington residents.

Today is Guinness World Records day so the perfect time to have a look at our record breakers.

Here are the best we could find.

• Fastest half-marathon dressed as a gingerbread person (female)

Delicious victory! Fastest marathon female dressed as a gingerbread girl - Cat Dascendis #LondonMarathon pic.twitter.com/CoyPuODjoN

— Guinness World Records (@GWR) April 23, 2017

On September 17 2017, Cat Dascendis completed the fastest half-marathon as a female dressed as a gingerbread person.

More impressively, this was just five months after she already completed the fastest full marathon dressed as a gingerbread person, which was in March 2017.

Cat's half-marathon time in Warrington was 1:43:49. 

She is from Wigan, but completed the half-marathon in Warrington during the then-English half-marathon, at the age of 35.

• Largest attendance of a crayfish party (multiple venue)

Something a bit wackier, here.

18 different IKEAs across the UK hosted multiple parties to celebrate 'Crayfish Day' back in 2011.

A crayfish party is held as part of traditional celebrations that take place across Nordic countries.

The tradition began in Sweden, where it is known as kräftskiva.

On August 3 2011, 4,967 individuals attended crayfish parties across the 18 locations - including at Warrington's IKEA.

This equates to roughly 275 people attending each party.

• World's oldest sports shop

The shop was located in the market before it closed (Image: Newsquest)

In 2014, Whites Sports Shop was crowned the oldest, having been trading consecutively in Warrington for 113 years.

The shop opened in March 1901 on Sankey Street, and was presented the award in May 2014 at its store which was then based in the market.

Sadly, the store closed later that year, though it appears as though it still holds the accolade as oldest in the world, as there do not seem to be any shops overtaking it on the Guinness World Records site.

• Largest collection of James Bond memorabilia

Nick's collection has more than 12,000 items (Image: Guinness World Records)

In November 2011, Nick Bennett was verified as having the largest amount of James Bond memorabilia in the world.

Being kept in a warehouse in Warrington as of November 21 2011, it was recorded by Guinness World Records that Nick had more than 12,000 items of 007-themed memorabilia.

In total, Nick was keeping 12,463 pieces of memorabilia in the Warrington warehouse at the time.

Nick, from Leigh, only began actively collecting Bond memorabilia following the release of Pierce Brosnan's debut outing as Bond in 1994's GoldenEye.

• Most tries in a rugby league career

Brian Bevan scored 796 tries between 1945 and 1964 (Image: Newsquest)

Coming as a surprise to very few, the holder of this record is the legendary Brian Bevan.

Scoring a record-setting 796 tries between 1945 and 1964 during 16 seasons with Warrington, followed by two seasons with Blackpool Borough.

Bevan scored 740 tries for Warrington, 17 for Blackpool Borough, and 39 in representative matches.

He is the only player to have been inducted into the Australian and British rugby league halls of fame.

• Youngest documentary presenter (male)

Aneeshwar Kunchala is the youngest male documentary presenter (Image: Newsquest)

Making his name on the 2022 series of Britain's Got Talent, Aneeshwar Kunchala is now a world record holder.

Despite being knocked out of the talent competition, the Warrington schoolboy was invited to present a documentary as part of a broadcast during COP27.

This meant that, at the age of seven years and 288 days, Aneeshwar became the youngest-ever male presenter of a documentary.

The documentary was aired on November 5 2022.