England v Germany expected to break World Cup betting records

William Hill has predicted that the match could well set a new record, with a massive eight-figure sum expected to be bet by punters.

The odds indicate no clear favourite to win the tie, but the one thing that does seem certain is that a lot of cash will be at stake.

Spokesman Graham Sharpe commented: "This match has the potential to produce a bigger betting turnover than the final given the rivalry between the two countries over the years and it is a certainty that over £25 million will be at stake on the outcome.

"And if England do go through and meet Argentina in the next round that could be an even bigger betting game."

The company has already revealed that the World Cup is on track to be the biggest betting event ever, with wagers totalling more than £1 billion anticipated.

And the competition has sparked some unusual bets so far, with one man having a £100 gamble at odds of 10,000/1 that his unborn son will score for England in the 2030 edition of the tournament.

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Longest Model Train World Record set by Miniatur Wunderland

Longest Model Train Guinness World Record set by Miniatur Wunderland Hamburg, Germany Exclusive Full Video Online.



An HO (1:87.1) scale model train measuring 110.3 m ( 361 ft 10 in) made up of 3 locomotives of type "lore" and 887 carriages was constructed by Miniature Wunderland in Hamburg, Germany, on November 27, 2005. If the model had been a full-scale train it would have measured 9.607 km (5.969 miles) long.

The Miniatur Wunderland in Hamburg, Germany has 700 trains, 4,000 automobiles, 165,000 trees and 250,000 individual lights and a track lengh of 5.6 miles has set the Guinness world record for the largest miniature railroad.

World Longest Handshaking Record

There are a lot of different kinds of handshakes, but nobody in San Francisco has ever taken glad-handing as far as Kevin Whittaker and Cory Jens are doing today.

The two buddies put 'er there at 2:07 p.m. in front of San Francisco's Ferry Building and have been shaking all day long in an effort to break the world handshaking record.

Whittaker, 31, of San Francisco, and Jens, 30, of Muscatine, Iowa, don't plan to stop until about 11:15 p.m., when they will have broken the 9-hour record set by two Germans.

"World records were made to be broken," said Whittaker, a corporate litigator who also owns a fashion company. "In the course of human history there has never been a handshake longer than nine hours, so we are doing something that no one has ever done before in the history of humankind."

Hyperbole aside, Whittaker and Jens chose the handshake record because it sounded easy to break.

"I looked up what some of the weakest records were and I found that one of the records, the world record for handshaking was only nine hours and was held by two German gentlemen," Whittaker said. "I'm not going to break the 100 meter dash record, but I thought I could break this record."

He called Jens and asked him if he wanted to come out and try to break the record.
"Jens said 'I'll be there,' " and history was set in motion, said Whittaker.

He quickly put up the 300 British pounds and arranged for witnesses to send affidavits to the Guinness Book of World Records to confirm it when the task is accomplished.

All that's left is the handshaking. The two men practiced three weeks ago while attending the Coachella music festival in Palm Springs.

"It was so hot that we started sweating so much that we couldn't do it," Whittaker said. "Our hands slipped apart."

Their work is cut out for them. This morning, the two men bucked up for the attempt at a cocktail party, where they met Michael Lennon, 22, of Ireland, and Paul Gallasch, 22, of Australia, who are on an around-the-world tour.

The world travelers decided to join them in the attempt, starting about an hour after the Americans. The plan now is to break the record, buy champagne, and return and uncork the champagne when the foreign travelers tie the record.

It hasn't been as easy as they thought.

"We went to the bathroom around 5 p.m. and that was tricky," Whittaker said. "We were shoulder to shoulder. One was facing the urinal while the other was facing the inside of the bathroom."

Whittaker said he thinks the training in Palm Springs helped.

"We developed a couple of handshaking techniques," he said. "One involves putting both your pinkies out, which allows an opening where air gets in and cools you off. The other is that one of us shakes and does all the work while the other one relaxes."

Still, the joy of handshaking only goes so far.

"Its not that fun, believe me," he said. "I'm a little tired. My shoulder is tired. In fact, it's extremely painful."

"What I'm worried about," he said. "is that the Germans will get wind of this and they will call us and challenge us to a shakeoff in some neutral country like Iceland."

News Source : sfgate.com
E-mail Peter Fimrite at pfimrite @ sfchronicle.com