Record-breaking bid to recreate Ripping Yarns scene

More than 250 people are set to take part in a record-breaking ‘hop’ – to recreate a scene from the Michael Palin and Terry Jones series Ripping Yarns.

The stunt next month has been engineered to mark the DVD release of the cult Seventies comedy on DVD, and mimics an incident from the pilot episode, Tomkinson’s Schooldays.

In that episode, Palin – playing a pupil at the bleak Graybridge boarding school – had to take part in a 30-mile hop as punishment. However, DVD firm distributors Network have gone for a more manageable 400-metre version.

They are hoping to set Guinness World Records for the largest group hop and the fastest 400m hop (currently seven minutes) at Hampstead Heath Athletics Track, North London, on March 3. Both Jones and Palin will be attending, and giving awards to charity for the winners.

A spokesman for Network said: ‘Thankfully Messieurs Palin and Jones have rejected the idea of pitting members of the public in the much -featured grizzly bear fight (still compulsory for some boys at Graybridge), or a St Tagder's Day ceremony (where students are nailed to the school walls).’

More details are available on Network’s Facebook page.

Here is the clip from the original series:

Published: 13 Feb 2012