By Jeff Hampton
Everyone knew he had it in him, and now Tim Shadbolt has proved he is one of the world's greatest talkers.
The Invercargill mayor set a new world record for the longest non-stop interview, and even after 26 hours of talking he didn't want to stop.
Tim Shadbolt was finally interrupted, but it didn't matter. He and Cue TV host Tom Conroy had just talked their way to a new world record – the world's longest non-stop TV interview – 26 hours and four seconds.
What's more, the veteran orator wanted to keep on going.
“Most definitely I feel so wound up now,” said the mayor. “It may just be the buzz of having a huge live audience that's hyped me up.”
“Just the first four hours were hard to get through,” said interviewer Tom Conroy. “But once we got through that first section I thought ‘we have got something special going here’.”
Mr Shadbolt is taking money raised to St John ambulance, with the whole thing overseen by an official from Guinness World Records.
“They did actually get to the record at just after midnight last night, but today they utterly smashed it,” said Chris Sheedy of Guinness Word Records.
The previous television record, set in Spain, was just over 12 hours, but Mr Shadbolt and Mr Conroy also smashed the 24-hour non-stop broadcasting record set last year by Australian media identity Peter Fitzsimons.
Mr Shadbolt showed no sign of a throat infection, which gave him a scar earlier in the week.
“Imagine giving up or failing after 11 and a half hours or something and breaking no records,” said the world record holder.
With the record now well and truly his, the mayor headed off for a nap to get ready for a busy week of speaking engagements.
3 News
source: newshub archive
