USA: Two men set new record for crossing New York's entire subway system in 24 hours.

Record ID: 856922

  • Title: USA: Two men set new record for crossing New York's entire subway system in 24 hours.
  • Date: 25th August 2006
  • Summary: MATT GREEN AND DONALD BADACZEWSKI SPEAKING TO REPORTERS ON THE PLATFORM MATT GREEN AND DONALD BADACZEWSKI SITTING ON THE PLATFORM A CONGRATULATORY PLACARD.
  • Embargoed: 9th September 2006 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Usa
  • City:
  • Country: USA
  • Topics: Light / Amusing / Unusual / Quirky
  • Reuters ID: LVA8DKSA0CTSACWTVRNGBFVKHYPA
  • Aspect Ratio:
  • Story Text: Friends Donald Badaczewski and Matt Green, who began a New York subway challenge on Wednesday (August 23), set a new record completing their journey in 24 hours and two minutes. They rode the subway trains through every station in the New York City subway system.
    Their quest began at 0600 ET (1000 GMT) on Wednesday (August 23) at the Rockaway Park station in Queens, and ended at Pelham Bay Park station in Queens this morning (Thursday) at 0600 ET (1000 GMT).
    Green and Badaczewski met at the University of Virginia. Their interest in transportation alerted them to an existing NYC subway record, set in 1998 -- the entire NY subway system was traversed in 25 hours and 11 minutes. Matt and Don set out intent to break that record.
    "Its everything I expected," Don said, speaking of the 24 hour journey. "I'm very tired, I'm very pleased to be done. I guess we broke the record which is nice but more than that it was really unique and you never see anyone doing this."
    Donald Badaczewski's girlfriend was there to greet him at the Pelham Bay Park station along with reporters and camera people.
    Matt and Don recorded telephone reports and callers were able to get regular updates of their progress. They also kept a log of when they board and disembark each train. Because time and bathroom access was very limited, the friends survived on beef jerky and water -- as little thereof as possible.
    "We had several transfers where we really had to sprint through the stations and after it had been several hours and we hadn't had any sleep and eaten almost nothing you know, it was pretty tough to keep up that sprint. So that was kind of tough for us physically and then on some of the later stretches it was kinda hard to stay awake on the train but we managed to, we didn't fall asleep any," said Matt Green.
    The rules for this attempt were set up by previous record holder, Peter Samson, who set up "The Amateur New York Subway Riding Committee," which lays down the do's and don'ts of such a record challenge.
    The men attracted modest attention from commuters who recognized them and knew of their quest for the record.
    "We actually met several people who recognized us on the subway and they were almost all really supportive and wished us well and so which was great, you know. Some people thought we were a little bit weirder than others but they were all were wishing us well and hoping we could break the record," said Green.
    New York City's subway system is over one hundred years old and according to the transit authority, there are 468 stations and the trains are used by about 4.5 million passengers every weekday. ENDS.
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