​A serial Guinness World Record holder achieved a marathon time under six hours while adorned with an astonishing 125 T-shirts. David Rush, renowned for holding the most concurrent Guinness World Records titles, said he chose to pursue the record for the most T-shirts worn during a marathon after previously setting the half-marathon version with 137 T-shirts at the 2025 Famous Idaho Potato Half Marathon. “In the heat of that victory, I felt invincible. I thought, ‘If I can do this for 13 miles, I can easily double it.’ That was a classic case of pride before a very painful fall,” Rush wrote online.
To prepare for the challenge, Rush spent months training while carrying heavy weights and layering thick clothing. He completed the 2026 YMCA Famous Idaho Potato Marathon on May 16 donning 125 shirts. During the attempt, he encountered a major health scare when he began overheating and ran out of ice; he eventually paused his run at a golf course along the route. “Patrick, one of my support runners, sprinted into the pro shop to beg for emergency ice. That ice was the only reason I didn’t end up in the hospital,” Rush recounted.
Rush crossed the finish line with a time of 5 hours, 54 minutes, and 50 seconds, narrowly beating the Guinness World Records cutoff of six hours by a mere five minutes. “The process of peeling 125 shirts off my body felt like an exorcism,” he said. “My skin was red, raw, and crisscrossed with bloody, five-inch-long chafing marks where the fabric had rubbed against my skin for six hours. My back bore an indentation from the constant pressure of 43 pounds of clothing.” Guinness World Records has now confirmed that Rush officially broke the previous record of 100 T-shirts and is the new titleholder for the most T-shirts worn during a marathon.