Swinging stoush: World record holder claims Napier teen's rest breaks invalidate his record claim

The official world record holder for the longest marathon on a swing says a Napier teen's consistent rest breaks will likely invalidate his world record claim.

But Charlie O'Brien says the methods that helped him clock up a total of 33 hours and 11 minutes on a park swing in Taradale Park last Thursday were both sensible and legal.

The back-and-forth is the latest development in a saga that has gone up and down for O'Brien since he sat on the swing and pendulumed himself into Hawke's Bay legend.

Video footage, log books and statements all need to be assessed before O'Brien can take the title, but current world record holder Aimee Pivott, from Pukekohe, says he won't.

Relieved Taradale High School student Charlie O'Brien after he broke the Guinness World Record for a swinging on a park swing for 33 hours. Photo / File

Pivott swung for 32 hours two minutes and three seconds in October 2013.

The mum-of-two beat an existing record of 31 hours, set by a Canadian in 2008, and she says she had to do it the hard way.

"At this stage he has not broken the record by an hour," she said.

"My attempt was for an amazing cause ... Through the course of swinging I fractured my pelvis in four places doing it for the community."

Pivott was raising money with her swingathon for a liberty wheel chair swing in Pukekohe.

"We raised just over $6000 in my 33 hours of swinging, with the resulting $30,000 swing finally getting brought over from Australia and installed 10 months after I did my Guinness World Record swing."

Throughout the challenge, O'Brien was allowed to take five-minute rest breaks each hour, but Pivott said that any breaks he took off the swing needed to be deducted from the 33 hours he swung for.

But O'Brien said the deduction of the five-minute breaks was incorrect.

He provided Hawke's Bay Today with the rules he was given, which state that "rest breaks do still count towards the final total length of time. However it is not permitted to add any remaining rest time available to the total at the end of the attempt."

The 16-year-old said he and the support team experienced some technical issues with the video recording at some stage during Wednesday night, which may affect his chances of gaining the title - but he was keeping his fingers crossed.

Current record holder for longest swing marathon Aimee Pivott doesn't believe that O'Brien will beat her record by an hour. Photo / Supplied.

Team support member Kate Shellard said the support team would be gathering this weekend to go through the footage and witness statements collected during O'Brien's 33-hour swing.

"We haven't got the video back yet so we can't put anything into the Guinness World Records, so she still holds the record for now."

O'Brien said he probably should have spent more time on the swing to prevent any chance of missing out on the record.

"But I don't know how much longer I could have made."