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Jump Rope Heroes: Watch School Kids Set A One-Minute Guinness World Record

The video is mesmerizing, if a bit noisy: Moving in a figure-eight pattern, elementary school students hop over a jump rope with perfect timing, setting a new Guinness World Record with an incredible 225 skips in one minute.

A team of 14 students from Japan's Fuji Municipal Harada Elementary School took part in the feat, with two swinging the rope and 12 students hopping through in an orderly blur, maintaining enough space to avoid a single disastrous mistake and enough pace to set the new 60-second mark.

"With a whole lot of practice and dedication, the kids broke the record set by their rivals at Hiromi Elementary School," Guinness says, "who achieved 217 skips in a minute back in 2013."

Each of the 12 skippers jumped through the rope more than 18 times, Guinness says.

As one comment on the Guinness Facebook page reads, "at first glance i thought it was a GIF on an endless repeat loop."

While the students' record stands as a testament to their focus and coordination, it could both inspire and dismay many adults who find themselves in charge of elementary-age kids — or, indeed, many adults who find themselves in charge of other adults.

Copyright 2020 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Bill Chappell is a writer and editor on the News Desk in the heart of NPR's newsroom in Washington, D.C.
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