Outside Edge (12/09/10)

The bikes that spoke volumes

Chris Davies should be over the moon. In fact he could have cycled to the moon and back twice over. For the 73-year-old is believed to have pedalled further than anyone else in history after completing more than 900,000 miles on his Hobbs bicycle. And he has recorded every trip he made since his first ride in 1950 when he travelled the six and a half miles from his home in Havant, Hampshire to his grandmother's beach hut on Hayling Island and loved it so much he wrote down all the details. He is patently more attached to his bike than another pensioner, Richard Bialon from Stuart, Florida who was arrested after having a heated and "obscene" argument with his bicycle at 4am outside a petrol station. The 68-year-old was charged with disorderly intoxication. Obviously he couldn't handle the bar. Or he was just really tyred.

£10,000

Amount of damage caused by inmates at Cookham Wood Young Offenders Institute in Rochester, Kent when staff switched off televisions showing the Wimbledon quarter-final between Vera Zvonareva and Kim Clijsters. Three men have been charged with violent disorder after the five-hour stand-off.

Grand day out on the riverbank

Here's an achievement that's really off the scales: Californian Steve Wozniak is the first man to catch 1,000 species of fish. The 47-year-old has spent 10 years and £50,000 in his quest, travelling to 63 countries and devoting 20,000 hours to catching anything from a minnow in the River Thames at Marlow to a 900lb shark. He took two years to capture an Atlantic salmon in Scotland, and finally caught his 1,000th victim when he lured a 2lb coalfish in a Norwegian fjord. In Wuhan, China, two men came to blows at an angling contest after they both tried to reel in the same fish. Zhen Tsung said: "I thought I had a really big fish because of the struggle it was putting up. Then I saw I wasn't fighting a fish, I was trying to reel in another fisherman." But it was Yo Hin's catch since his hook was further inside the fish's mouth...assuming that it was the right hook.

Good week

Warwick Wolves and Leeds Badgers, who played the longest-ever game of football at the University of Warwick for 57 hours, beating the previous record of 42 hours five minutes, to raise money for the Meningitis Trust – the Badgers won 425-354.

Holcroft Grange care home in Warrington, Cheshire, where residents have started a netball team with an average age of 90, including 101-year-old Olive Cook.

Aaron Fotheringham, who has performed the first double backflip in a wheelchair in Woodward, Pennsylvania.

Bad week

Jeremy Burfoot, whose attempt to jet-ski from London to New Zealand came to an end when he was forced to slow down in high seas and was left stranded off the coast of Greece.

The Red Foxes dance team, who were banned from the Fiba World Basketball Championships in Turkey because their act was considered "too provocative".

The Scottish Football Association, who had to apologise after their supporters jeered the Liechtenstein national anthem, which has the same tune as "God save the Queen".

Don't scoff, Perry's on top of the table

For those who like their sporting activities to include copious amounts of food, this weekend is enough to leave you open-mouthed. The Raw Onion Eating Contest in Newent, Gloucestershire yesterday may have brought a tear to the eye and the World Black Pudding Throwing Championships in Ramsbottom, Lancashire require guts and a little pig-headedness. Today the World Porridge-Making Championships in Carrbridge, Scotland will no doubt cause a stir. Meanwhile Perry Watkins, an inventor from Wingrave in Buckinghamshire, has set a new world record for the fastest piece of furniture after averaging speeds of 113.8mph with a dining table. At the Santa Pod Raceway in Northamptonshire his Queen Anne table – complete with silver service – which he calls "Fast Food" beat the previous record of 92mph set by a sofa in 2007. There is a 1994 Reliant Scimitar Sabre under the table, boosted by a nitrous oxide kit. A waiter won't have long to wait.