A Bristol magician is celebrating after smashing the official world record for perfect playing card shuffling.
David Willmott, a full-time, professional magician and entertainer based in Bristol and London, broke the record set in Hollywood last year at the Illusions Magic Bar in Bristol on Tuesday.
He achieved the largest number of consecutive, perfect ‘Faro’ shuffles – one in which each individual card is slid between two others in each shuffle, meaning that eight consecutive shuffles returns the deck to its original order.
The previous record – achieved in Hollywood by John Walton in August 2009 – was 2,784 Faro shuffles in 12 hours.
But Willmott, starting his attempt at 9am, matched the target in just seven hours, 10 minutes and 15 seconds. He then went on to complete 2,904 shuffles before taking a break at 4.35pm. On resuming the session at 5.15, he raised the record to 3,200 shuffles, at which point he stopped at 6.15pm.
And where his predecessor had changed regularly to clean, specialist decks, David used just one deck of cards – a run-of-the-mill United States Playing Card Company Bicycle deck, bought locally.The record-breaking session was witnessed, photographed and videoed. Guinness World Records has been formally notified and is expected to adjudicate the record within six weeks.
Willmott said: “I work full-time as a magician and the sleight of hand practised over many years in my close-up table magic proved invaluable when beating the world record for perfect Faro shuffles. I’m happy to bring this world record to the UK.”
Guinness World Record attempt on 6th April 2010 by UK magician David Willmott - completed 2784 perfect faro shuffles in 7 hours 10 minutes. Video and Photos.