The work of being one of the Guinness World Record adjudicators

Brian Sobel is based in Australia, but last year he flew to New Zealand to adjudicate the record-breaking haka at Eden Park with over 6000 participants.

It was a huge undertaking, he told RNZ’s Nights, with 120 spotters ensuring everything was legitimate.

“We did a massive count from about 60 different angles. You have to film the entrances and exits, you have to register people multiple times through turnstiles and QR codes.

“People have to stand in certain spots, and we even have spot checkers - one for every 50 people for any participation event like that where they have to see the people actually doing the thing in real time in order to be counted.”

The first edition of the Guinness Book of Records was printed 70 years ago and is now a household name, with over 155 million copies sold worldwide.

And it remains in good health, he says, with the printed book still published in hardcover.

The first copy, in 1955, stemmed from a debate the head of the Guinness Brewery was having with friends.

“Sir Hugh Beaver, was out with a hunting party as they would be doing at that time in the early 1950s, they were having arguments about the fastest game, they were having arguments about the tallest this and the furthest that and the head of the Guinness brewery had this stroke of genius, why don't we put this all down in a book?”

A copy was put in all the brewery’s pubs throughout Ireland, he says.

“It was super popular, the book was stolen over and over and over again and they realised maybe we should sell it and so they started to sell it and 70 years later, 155 million copies later, 11 million Instagram followers later, 28.5 million TikTok followers later, we're still going.”

The public appetite for record-setting remains undimmed, he says.

“Last year we had just under 50,000 applications and we have just under 70,000 active records at any given time, so it's a lot.”

The Eden Park haka isn’t the only mass record attempt he’s adjudicated recently.

“I had another one in the Philippines, it was 6,900 people, the most people applying lipstick.

“It was for this massive music festival that was put on by a makeup brand…they gave one to everybody in the stands. And at one point, everybody, male, female, otherwise, everybody's putting on lipstick. And it was fantastic.”

He was recently adjudicating at the Sydney Marathon, fertile ground for record breaking, he says.

“We had fastest marathon dressed as a Star Wars character, that's a popular one, this was Darth Vader, who smashed the record.

“The fastest marathon dressed as a glass. This person dressed as a pint glass of Guinness.”

Even in its 70th year there are still records waiting to be set, he says.

“We're creating this campaign called the Be Part of It, pretty much saying give it a go, be a part of it, do something fun, do something exciting.”