Exclusive | Ambitious classmates conquer 41 NYC playgrounds in a day to beat previous Guinness World Record

Upper West Side classmates Hannah Bruner and Wilder McGraw, both 8, woke up one morning and decided to make history.The two adventurers, along with Bruner’s mom and McGraw’s dad, embarked on a 9-hour, 21-mile mission, biking through the Upper West Side and Midtown West to take on an ambitious summer challenge: break the world record of visiting the most NYC playgrounds in a single day.Together, the four visited 41 playgrounds last Friday, shattering the previous Guinness World Record of 26 stops.“One day when me and my mom were sitting in the park, we visited like 5 playgrounds and we wondered what the world record for visiting playgrounds in a day was,” Bruner told The Post.“It was only 26, so we decided it was easy to beat.”“The kids are getting older and we only have a little bit of playground time left with them,” Bruner’s mother, Jesenia Ruiz de la Torre, told The Post.

“It almost felt like a way to say goodbye to the playground.”Ruiz de la Torre made a list of playgrounds on the Upper West Side and Midtown West using Google Maps and mapped out a path, marking every green space she saw in order, using a zigzag method to ensure she didn’t miss any parks.“We strategized about the order that would make the most sense in advance,” Ruiz de la Torre explained to The Post.“Then, on the day of, Wilder’s dad plugged the planned route into his GPS to make sure we took the most efficient route to each playground.”The route hit a range of parks from massive playgrounds to tiny apartment-building extensions, starting at 8 a.m.

sharp and finishing around 5 p.m.“I’ve always wanted to break a world record,” eight-year-old McGraw told The Post, admitting that the biggest challenge for him was ignoring his rumbling stomach.“I had to persevere through not getting hungry and focus on the fun, especially when the parents would go down the mini slides.”The group hustled to finish the challenge before Spain’s World Cup match later that...