50+'er Blue Chip Recruit spotted
Denver, you need to send out a recruiter to sign this guy to a commitment to join this forum next year.
HINSDALE, Ill. -- George Hood didn't go to Disney World after riding a stationary bike for an apparent record of 85 hours. He checked into a hospital.
After two days of recovery and lots of fluids and sleep, the 49-year-old Aurora man pronounced himself almost back to normal Monday as he described his bid, still awaiting certification, for a place in the Guinness World Records book.
"I've got a few aches in my left leg, but it's nothing that I can't handle," he said by phone shortly before ending what he called a precautionary stay at Adventist Hinsdale Hospital.
Hood climbed on the bike at 4 a.m. last Wednesday at Five Seasons Sports Club in nearby Burr Ridge and didn't get off for good until shortly before midnight Saturday, having surpassed the record of 82 hours set last year by Brian Overkaer of Denmark. Guinness rules allowed him a five-minute break for every completed hour of cycling.
"I had no doubts" about breaking the record, Hood said, but exhaustion started to set in early Saturday.
"The mind tries to shut you down," he said. "The room started to change shape and the dimensions changed."
Statistics from the ride were eye-opening: the equivalent of nearly 1,083 miles spun and 27,854 calories burned, which had him curious to step on a scale to find out how many pounds he'd lost.
But no number may have been more impressive than the approximately $30,000 the Drug Enforcement Administration supervisor raised for the Illinois chapter of COPS, an organization that helps the families of slain police officers.