Seth Johnson
Cheers erupted underneath The Swamp Saturday morning after Jonny Gordon landed a bean bag straight through the cornhole board and into the record book for the longest toss―75.14 feet.
Jonny and Justin Gordon, his brother, began tossing the bags an hour earlier to see who would land the winning shot first.
But the ramp up to Saturday’s achievement started weeks earlier, when the brothers decided to focus on the longest corn toss record as their avenue into the Guinness Book of World Records.
Justin had researched other records, like the most straws fit into your mouth, but said he didn’t have a particularly large mouth.
“This one seemed like it was feasible,” Justin said.
The current world record was set on June 26, 2021, in Boston by Matthew Grear. His distance: 62 feet, 6 inches.
The brothers have played cornhole before, but not from this distance.
On Saturday, the question was less if someone would make a toss and more who would be first and how fast. Both brothers had made the 75-foot throw in practice within 50 shots―with Justin making it in only seven.
“We did not expect it to take that long,” Jonny said to the spectators afterward. “It didn’t take that long in practice.”
He hit the winning shot on his 103rd throw after a little less than an hour of competition.
Justin and Jonny kept switching, each throwing the allotted bean bags before swapping places and running the length of the boards, high-fiving each other while passing.
Family and friends from the Gordon’s church had gathered to watch the record-breaking attempts, and four phones attached to chairs recorded the throws as proof to send to Guinness.
One phone recorded the entire distance from board to board, another captured the person throwing, and two aimed at the target.
After hitting the shot, a surveyor measured the distance, and once the official report is done, Jonny will send the information to Guinness, who will take four to eight weeks to confirm and officially change the record.
And just how does it feel to be a world record holder?
“It’s amazing, life changing,” Jonny said.