Plank pro: Former Marine George Hood sets record - Off Duty, Sports, Hunting, Fishing - Army Times

Plank pro: Former Marine George Hood sets record

The Tough Guy of the Week Award goes to former Marine George Hood after surviving his recent grueling pain-a-thon to break the world record for longest plank.

No, not the geeky photo pose — rather, the core-crunching, back-breaking test of strength familiar to anyone who has ever lingered at the top end of a push-up.

With sweat pouring off his body as supporters cheered, Hood held his plank for one hour, 20 minutes and 5.01 seconds.

Ouch.

He beat the previous official record, held by Australian Richard Hazard, by 30 minutes. The most recent unofficial record holder was 71-year-old Betty Sweeney of Plover, Wis., who stayed balanced on her toes and forearms, body in a straight line, for 36 minutes, 58 seconds, on Sept. 28.

“The last five minutes was pretty brutal,” Hood told onlookers at his event shortly after collapsing. “It was one minute at a time trying to control the spasms and the shaking.”

Hood, a 54-year-old former Marine officer, Naval Criminal Investigative Service gumshoe, Drug Enforcement Administration special agent and hired gun for a military contractor in Afghanistan, is a personal trainer in Illinois. He has broken four other Guinness world records — all feats of endurance, including riding more than 220 hours on a stationary bike in 2010.

His latest record — notched at the Eggsperience Pancakes & Café in Naperville, Ill. — is part of his training to reclaim his spinning record, which fell last year, he told local reporters.