Alberta team breaks record for world’s longest hockey game, raises money for children’s hospital

After more than 10 straight days of gameplay, 40 hockey players in Alberta have broken the record for the world’s longest game, beating their own record.

The initiative started in 2012, when 40 players attempted to break the Guinness World Record for the longest game of hockey in order to raise money for the Alberta Children’s Hospital Foundation. At the time, they raised $1.2 million after 246 hours of play, according to the group’s fundraising website. Two years later, they broke the record again, raising $1.7 million.

Now, a decade after their first world record, the players have set a new record after 261 consecutive hours of gameplay that began on March 31 and ended on April 11 at the Chestermere Recreation Centre in Chestermere, Alta.

“It pushed us to our limits,” Alex Halat, the founder of the Hockey Marathon for Kids and one of the players, told CTV News Channel on Wednesday evening.

The 40 players were split into two teams of 20, with each person playing four hours on the ice before taking four hours off.

Halat said the game took its toll on the players’ bodies.

“Your feet swell almost two to three sizes, both my knees are blown, my hips are blown, my back is blown” he said. “We have folks with staph infections now just from all the sweating and all the gear. It was daunting.”

The four hours off the ice was also barely enough time to recuperate after getting out of all of their hockey gear, showering, heading to physiotherapy, getting a bite to eat, and heading somewhere to try to sleep. And as players dropped off the roster due to injuries, the remaining players got more and more ice time.

Even after the game, Halat said it’s been hard to get back on a regular sleep schedule.

“You know, talking to the players this morning … at 1:30 in the morning I sent a note to say, “Hey, who’s up? I feel like I just missed a shift,'” Halat said. “You keep waking up every hour and a half. And all of the players were up still.”

But despite the physical and emotional challenges of playing a 261-hour game, Halat said it doesn’t compare to the pain a cancer patient goes through.

“If you ask any of the players, for everything that we went through in the past 10-and-a-half days, they’d do it a thousand times over if it meant bringing a kid back home to his family,” Halat said.

Halat’s group is still accepting donations on their website.

“At the end of the day, cancer isn’t going anywhere for anyone, be it adults or youth,” he said. “We encourage folks to donate and help bring home a child.”