Missoula Duo Attempts to Set Lacrosse World Record

A Missoula father-son duo attempts to break a world record for most la crosse passes and catches in a single hour Friday.

Ryan Hanavan and his son Logan spent their Friday afternoon at The Sports Barn, Missoula's only indoor turf venue, aiming to leap into the Guinness Book of World Records. They needed 2,000 completions in 60 minutes to etch their names into the record book (for a second time, more on that later).

Where did the idea come from?

When COVID shut our lives down, Hanavan had his players doing drills or leisure activities like playing the game P-I-G over Zoom or FaceTime.

"I've been coaching lacrosse for a long time," said Hanavan. "We're always trying to get ways to improve their stick skills, spend more time getting better throwing and catching."

The idea stemmed from "watching some of those Guinness World Record videos. There were a couple of women who did a softball version of most passes in an hour," explained Hanavan. Ideas are great, but the Hanavans put their money where their mouths are.

"Coming out of it, my son Logan and I did one with two ball passing (that's when each guy throws a ball at the same time) and have a Guinness World Record now. We completed 40 of those in one minute," said Hanavan.

Logistics of breaking a world record

Breaking a Guinness World Record isn't something you can half-ass in your backyard. You can't just write an email to the record holders saying "ok, we completed 10 thousand passes in one hour. I'd like my record now." No sir, a lot more documentation goes into it.

"So I have a bunch of people sitting in the bleachers right now," described Hanavan. " They're gonna act as witnesses and timekeepers. They'll sign some official Guinness World Record statements, we'll have the whole thing recorded."

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Even the minor, or maybe not so minor, details need to be proven. The sticks must be official length, the balls must be official size and it must be documented that Logan and Ryan are standing ten meters apart.

The endgame

I already wrote where the idea came from, but Hanavan hopes a lot more comes out of it than just a couple of personal world records.

"Our hope is that we inspire enough of the kids in the community to beat us," Hanavan desired.

Good luck to the Hanavans on achieving a second world record. On top of a difficult task, they had to accomplish it with an estimated high temp of 90 degrees.

Yikes.

UPDATE: THEY DID IT. 2,504 CATCHES IN ONE HOUR