There were many challenges for Luke Lorick as he tried to set the world record for the longest backward cornhole toss, but probably the biggest was to get a surveyor to take him seriously.
Lorick, of Loveland, is 40 and remains a fun-loving guy, as you might expect from someone who wanted to set any kind of world record, let alone one for cornhole.
Lorick grew up in football country, deep in South Carolina, and he even attended the University of South Carolina, graduating in 2004. More than a decade ago, he founded Tailgating Challenge, a business that celebrates, coordinates and informs about tailgating and the many products inspired by it, because he, like many of his friends from the south, thought tailgating and watching a football game was about the most fun way to spend a Saturday or Sunday (or both).
Surveyors, on the other hand, aren’t known for being as fun-loving as Lorick. So when Lorick left them phone messages, saying he needed a surveyor to confirm the distance for his world record attempt, you can just imagine their reaction.
“They either thought I was full of [crap],” Lorick says, “or that it wasn’t worth it.”
Why did he need a surveyor? Well, Lorick thought setting a world record sounded fun and maybe good for his business. But Guinness, the organization that confirms and tracks world records, takes this SERIOUSLY. This is the organization that documents the longest underwater kiss, or the longest fingernails, or the longest human tunnel traveled through by a skateboarding dog. So in case Lorick wanted to do something silly like set something up in his backyard and hit the shot, well, that would be cool, and it would be fun, but it wouldn’t be an official world record.
Instead, it took Lorick a year to get the record.
Lorick formed the business because he loves tailgating, but it hasn’t been, well, all fun and games. He built up a nice social media following—he reaches a million people a month, including nearly 200,000 on Facebook—by reviewing products and doing videos and coordinating parties. He does this all in his spare time, which takes him away from his wife or giant pet rabbits: The money he makes from the business is nice but not enough for him to quit his job at State Farm.
Friends and family supporting Luke Lorick at his attempt to set the world’s longest backwards cornhole shot.
When he contacted Guinness, he learned the organization has packages available of world records to set. But he wanted a record that had something to do with tailgating, and cornhole, of course, isn’t just a world championship sport (it really is), it’s probably the consummate tailgating activity besides eating, drinking or preparing to eat or drink.
Guinness offered him a stress-free package: The organization would send a judge to watch his toss and certify the world record on the spot. But that, Lorick says, would cost $10,000. Again, Tailgating Challenge is a nice side hustle, but Lorick didn’t have $10,000 to spend on a world record.
Instead, he had to jump through 10,000 hoops to get the record. OK, it wasn’t that many. It just felt that way.
First, he needed to certify the record through the American Cornhole Association. The organization provided official boards, bags and two team members to witness and ‘ref’ the Guinness World Record attempt. Can you imagine if someone just set up Cornhole boards on their own without referees? It would be chaos. It would also not be an official word record.
Then he got help from the City of Loveland and the daily newspaper to get him the crowd and public forum he’d need to witness his shot. He also did manage to convince a surveyor to check the distance, and yes, the surveyor had to be there, because if Lorick moved, that person would need to measure it again.
“If one person didn’t show,” Lorick says, “I was toast.”
Now all he had to do was make the shot.
Oh, yeah. The shot. We probably should have started the story this way. It’s a world record for a reason. It’s HARD. The world record for a “normal” shot is longer than 120 feet. That’s a long way. His shot would only be 36 feet and 7 inches, but backward, aka, not looking at it.
If that seems easy, well, it’s longer than you think. It’s the length of a telephone pole, or an average humpback whale, or a yellow school bus. It’s three stories tall. If you jumped from there, it would hurt, probably a lot.
Lorick posted a video on his semi-popular YouTube channel of him practicing at first, and many times the bag lands a comical distance from the board. It looks like he’s not looking, which, remember, he’s not. And here’s the thing: Lorick had to make the shot go in the hole, not just land it on the board.
He practiced all winter, and it took hours before he got better and better. On June 18, 2021, he would attempt the official shot, and he felt confident by that point that he could do it.
Did we mention it had to be in front of a crowd?
As it turns out, making a backward shot is different in your backyard than it is in front of hundreds of fidgety spectators and one impatient surveyor, even if some were his friends supporting him.
He started trying to make it, and, well, he kept missing. He kept shooting, and he kept missing. He started to feel like a fool.
He then told himself that this was something he’d done many times, probably the same words Patrick Mahomes told himself during the last drive of this year’s Super Bowl. And he sank the shot. It took him 10 minutes.
“It seems short,” Lorick says, especially when you consider the year of preparation that went into the record. “But it was the longest 10 minutes of my life.”
A lot of boring stuff had to happen after that, including gathering all the evidence and statements and stuff to show it was an official world record attempt. Then he had to wait. He submitted the packet in December 2021. The record went official last October.
He found a teensy bit of fame. He’s not sure if it helped his business, but he got on the pregame show of ESPN’s SEC Network, which was sort of a dream come true.
He has goals for 2023, but for now, they do not involve another world record. Those are a lot of work. This year, Lorick wants to have a little more fun.
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Dan England is NOCO Style’s assistant editor, and a freelance journalist based in Greeley.