And The Decade's Top Guinness World Records Are . . .

At the end of every decade, the officials at the Guinness Book of Records pick 100 of the best records in every category, and ask its readers to vote for their favorite one. Below are the results of some of the fun categories.

Person With the Most Records

Ashrita Furman, a 54-year old from Queens, New York, holds so many records that he is in the book for - 'most records held at the same time by an individual'. His achievements range from the most pogo sticks jump in one minute to the longest time balancing a milk bottle on his head, to creating the world's largest pencil. He has established 273 records since he started in 1979, 113 of which have still not been beaten.

Mr. Furman, who travels to different continents to perform his stunts has set a world record in every continent, including completing the fastest mile on a pogo stick, while in Antarctica, says he does it to show people that they can do anything if they set their mind to it. To read about all his fun records, check out his website www.ashrita.com.

Arts And Entertainment - The Simpsons

In this category, voters picked our beloved Simpson family, who has been on television since December of 1989 and is the longest running sitcom ever! What's even more interesting is the fact that their television debut was actually earlier than that - in April of 1987, when they were broadcast as short segments on another show. Twenty years and 443 episodes later, they remain as popular as ever, with audiences both young and old!

Living Planet - Heaviest Collossal Squid

This Collossal Squid won the reader's vote for the best record of the decade in the Living Planet section. Weighing over 990lbs, the 33ft-long creature was caught by fishermen in Antarctica's Ross Sea in 1987. Caught while it was feeding on an Antarctic Toothfish, the giant squid refused to let go of its prey even as it was being hauled in.

The fishermen froze the squid and donated it to a research center in New Zealand so that they could analyze this normally elusive creature. While this is the biggest one every caught, researchers believe that there are specimens bigger than this one that live in the deep waters of the Antarctic Ocean. To read more about the Collossal Squid, check out squid.tepapa.govt.nz/anatomy.

Epic Achievements - Longest Time To Hold One's Breath

Those of you who have tried holding your breath underwater, will understand why Tom Sietas was picked as the record of the decade - This German resident managed to hold his breath underwater for a whopping 17min and 19 sec, on live television.

Sports - Fastest 100 meters

In sports it was the achievements of the world's fastest human that appealed to the voters. Usan 'Lightning' Bolt stunned the world in August 2008 by running a 100m dash in 9.58 seconds. - And there are people who believe he can do it even faster than that!

Stunts - Longest Chewing Gum Wrapper Chain

While there are plenty of weird stunts in the record books, this one seemed to impress the readers the most - probably because this 58,266ft long, gum wrapper chain, that weighed over 800lbs took Gary Duschl from Virginia, USA over 44 years to build. We wonder how many packets of chewing gum he went through!

Do you have any personal world record favorites? If so, be sure to let us know by adding your comments below:

sources:dailymail.co.uk, worldrecordsacademy.org, wikipedia.org