TWO Ennis men have broken through the pain and fatigue barrier to chalk up a new Guinness World Record for non-stop singles snooker matches.
But it was touch and go for Gordon O’Loughlin and Kieran Ferns who broke the previous official record by almost 8 hours and are now in the frame for a new Guinness world record.
The two men completed three days and three nights of snooker games at Ennis Snooker and Pool Club, Market Street, racking up a total of 191 frames in 83 hours, but will have to wait for confirmation from Guinness that they have beaten the current official record.
The official Guinness World record for a snooker marathon is 72 hours – achieved by Nick Barrett and Andy Osborne at the Conservative Club in Market Harborough, Leicestershire, from May 3 to May 6, 2013. And last month, brothers Anthony and Nathan Hebblethwaite spent 76 hours playing 285 frames in Wakefield. This record has yet to be confirmed by Guinness and looks unlikely to stand for very long.
Gerard O’Loughlin, who took over Ennis Snooker and Pool Club last February, came up with the idea for the world record attempt with a charity twist.
Having just taken over I was looking for an event to publicise the club and realised that the official Guinness World record for a snooker marathon was 72 hours. Then I found out through social media that two other guys had completed 76 hours at the table. It takes about six to twelve weeks for Guinness to go through all the tapes as it has to be recorded, so I figured I’d have to get two guys to play for 80 hours plus five minutes an hour for breaks, which is added to the time,” Gerard explained.
After a lot of volunteers came forward for the record attempt, he settled on club members Kieran and Gordon and the men racked up the balls for their first game last Friday morning at 8 o’clock.
The record attempt couldn’t go ahead though without an official recording for the Guinness judges and Whytes Security Systems stepped in with a state-of-the-art recording system.
The players are allowed to pool their breaks and take them whenever they want and the two men put in 10 hours on Friday before taking a 50 minute break for a nap. The big problem for them both was waking up again and they abandoned sleep until Monday morning. In the meantime, former world champion Ken Doherty visited the club on Sunday night to encourage the two men and play an exhibition match.
“On Monday morning, Gordon was wrecked so he had to sleep and we had to send out an urgent appeal for a physio to work on Kieran. We were in trouble and I thought it was all over. I’d say we came within five minutes of it,” Gerard said.
Right on cue though, Christer Vik Smetana, a local massage therapist stepped in and helped Kieran to get back on his feet while Gordon’s dad helped the exhausted snooker player to perk up enough to continue their record attempt.
Finally at ten past twelve on Tuesday morning the new record was reached and family and friends were on hand to congratulate the men who continued to play until 1.30am.
Gerard has distributed sponsorship cards and asked people to donate through the club’s Facebook page to the cancer support charity Sláinte an Clár in Kilfenora using www.idonate.ie/snookermarathon . He reports an excellent response to the appeal which will continue online for a month
“I’m so proud of Kieran and Gordon and the support we received was fantastic. There are no words to describe how grateful we all are. This record would not have been possible without all the volunteers and the supporters. It honestly would not have worked. The lads broke the record but the volunteers and all our supporters made it possible in the end,” Gerry O’Loughlin said.
Now, having gone out in a baize of glory, all Kieran and Gordon need is a marathon break.
A native of Ennis, Colin McGann has been editor of The Clare Champion since August 2020. Former editor of The Clare People, he is a journalism and communications graduate of Dublin Institute of Technology.