Sports records that have been on the books for decades remain out of reach for literally thousands of athletes who have come up short while trying to set new ones.
After Joe DiMaggio finally went hitless in a game after batting safely in 56 consecutive MLB games, thousands of batters have failed to equal or even come close to his hitting streak.
On May 15, 1941, DiMaggio, one of three brothers who played center field in MLB, began his consecutive game hitting streak that did not end until July 17, 1941. During those 56 games, DiMaggio banged out 91 hits in 223 official times at bat to average .408 while hitting 15 home runs and registering 55 RBIs.
DiMaggio’s record has stood for 81 years, and only Pete Rose made a serious run at it in 1978 when he fell short after failing to hit safely after 44 straight games.
Other seemingly unbreakable MLB records are held by Ty Cobb whose career average is .366, Cy Young who posted 511 career pitching victories, Cal Ripken who played in 2,632 consecutive games, Sam Crawford who finished his career with 309 triples and Roger Hornsby who holds the single season highest batting average, .424 that he set in 1924.
After Wilt Chamberlain scored 100 points in an NBA game on March 2, 1962, thousands of basketball players have failed to come close to erasing his feat. The closest any player came was in 2006 when the late Kobe Bryant of the Los Angeles Lakers swished the nets for 81 against the Raptors.
That was 44 years after Chamberlain led Philadelphia to a 169-147 victory over the New York Knicks. Now 16 years later after Bryant’s 81, the likes of LeBron James and Seth Curry have not surpassed Bryant’s mark, much less Chamberlain’s 100.
Chamberlain still holds 72 NBA records, including scoring 65 or more in a single game 15 times, scoring 50 plus points in a single game 118 times, averaging 22.9 rebounds per game during his career and hauling down 55 rebounds in a single game.
The night Chamberlain scored 100, he broke his own NBA record of 78 that he had scored on Dec. 8, 1961 against the Los Angeles Lakers.
The most unlikely of record holders, Mike Austin, a 64-year-old golf teaching pro, hit the longest drive ever recorded in the history of golf during the 1974 U.S. National Seniors Open in Las Vegas.
With a 27-mile-per-hour tailwind at this back, Austin teed off toward the green that lay 450 yards away. Not only did his drive reach the green, but it crossed over it and came to rest 515 yards from the tee box.
Chandler Harper who had played 50 times with the likes of Sam Snead and Ben Hogan was playing in Austin’s group that day, and he said that he had never seen such a drive in his lifetime.
By comparison, Tiger Woods hit a 412 yard drive in a practice round while preparing to compete in the British Open in 1998, a drive that drew much praise.
Other long drives have been recorded by Rory Sabbatini, a 448 yard rocket, and one by Davis Love, III who hit a monster drive in the Mercedes Championships in 2004 that travelled 476 yards thanks in part to a tailwind behind him as the ball traveled toward a downhill green.
For the past 48 years, no golfer has come close to breaking Austin’s record, and RE/MAX long drive championships have been won by far lesser drives than 400 yards. For example, Sean “the Beast” Fister was crowned champion of the competition for hitting a 377 yard drive.
As for MLB’s longest home runs, Cecil Fielder 502-foot drive during MLB’s Tale of the Tape program set the record in Milwaukee in 1991.
However, when baseball aficionados discuss long home runs, Babe Ruth’s two will be foremost in their discussion. Ruth blasted the ball out of Sportsmen Park in 1915. His soaring drive was estimated to have traveled 470 feet, and “The King of Swat” hit another towering home run in Detroit in 1928 that travelled 500 feet.
Mickey Mantle landed in the “Guinness World Records” book after clouting a 634-foot home run in Briggs Stadium in 1960. He had blasted a 565-foot round-tripper at Griffith Stadium in 1953.
The longest home run caught on video was hit by Joey Meyer who was playing for the Triple A Denver Zephyrs. His tape-measure home run traveled into the upper deck and was determined to be a 582-foot home run.
As for the longest javelin throw, Jan Zelezny set a new world record in 1996 when he launched his throw of 323 ft. and one inch.
The women’s world record holder for the javelin throw belongs to Barbora Spotakova who completed a 237 ft. and one-and-one-half-inch throw in 2008.
Perhaps one of the most obscure world record holders is the late Glen Edward Gorbous, a Canadian baseball player who played for the Cincinnati Redlegs in 1955 and the Philadelphia Phillies in 1957.
Gorbous had a brief career in MLB, and he finished with a .238 batting average with four home runs and 29 RBIs.
However, after his MLB playing days were over, he competed in a baseball throwing competition, and on Aug. 1, 1957, he set the world record by throwing the baseball 445 ft. and 10 inches.
Gorbous was playing for the Omaha Cardinals in the American Association when he set the record that has remained in the record book for 64 and one half years.
Thousands of records exist on many levels of sports from amateur sports to professional sports, but those that last for decades without being broken will perhaps last for many more decades to come.