TORONTO -- A Montreal man has broken the Guinness World Record for most burpees in 12 hours.
With a framed photo of his late brother propped up by dumbbells in front of him, Samuel Finn pushed through 5,234 repetitions of the grueling exercise Friday night.
The accomplishment (dubbed “Burpees For Ced”) was done in honour of his brother Cedric, who was diagnosed in 2017 with a rare and aggressive soft tissue sarcoma. He died nine months later at the age of 27. As part of his efforts, Finn started a GoFundMe campaign, which has raised more than $54,000 since early October.
“If I can sum up my experience in a few words: 12 hours of pain!!” wrote Finn in a Facebook post online Saturday morning.
“It was a whole mental fight! AFTER ONLY 5 hours, I couldn't feel my feet and hands since all my blood was redirected to my organs and muscles. At some point I was thinking I might lose my toes (the head starts to imagine several scenarios after 5 hours of burpees).”
Finn’s mission inspired an outpouring of support on Friday, including from a line of athletes doing burpees across from him in solidarity. One man who spoke with CTV News Montreal said he didn’t even know Finn and wanted to show his support and see how many burpees he could do himself.
“I made a promise,” wrote Finn online. “I wasn't going to stop, no matter how much my body was going to ask me to stop!”
