DonnaJean Wilde, a 61-Year-Old Grandmother of 12, Held a Plank for Five Hours After Training With Her 3-Year-Old Granddaughter on Her Back

Five hours is 300 minutes, and DonnaJean Wilde, a 61-year-old grandmother of 12, spent every one of them in a plank. She held the position at the Huntsman World Senior Games in Utah on Oct. 6, 2026, according to Good Morning America, and Guinness World Records has received an application for the attempt and will review the evidence before it declares a record.

The mark she was chasing is her own. As of Nov. 1, the Guinness World Records listing for the longest abdominal plank by a woman still shows Wilde at 4 hours, 30 minutes and 11 seconds, set on March 21, 2024, in Magrath, Alberta. Five hours would add almost 30 minutes to that. The listing notes that records change daily and are not always published online right away, so the page may trail the latest review.

Rose, the 3-Year-Old Training Weight

Wilde trained with her granddaughter Rose, 3, lying on her back while she planked, Good Morning America reported. It is an unusual way to add resistance to an exercise that otherwise asks only for a straight body and steady breathing.

A plank, as NPR described it, is an abdominal exercise in which the body is held straight from head to heels, supported by the forearms and toes. Wilde began preparing for the five-hour attempt about six months ahead, planking four to five hours a day, according to a TODAY report republished by NBC 6 South Florida. The same report said she has planked about two hours a day for years, often while working or talking on the phone.

Her preparation for the earlier record followed the same pattern. Guinness’s 2024 write-up said she normally planked up to three hours a day and raised that to six hours before the March 2024 attempt, split into two three-hour sessions. It also reported that she started planking 12 years earlier after breaking her wrist, and that she finished her master’s degree while planking.

Wilde told NPR, in a story carried by WLRN, that she began planking about 15 years ago after breaking her arm. She planked in her cast at first and kept going after it came off. NPR reported that she types on a laptop while balanced on her elbows, wrote a book that way, and describes long exercise as giving her a rush similar to a runner’s high.

The idea of going to five hours had been on her mind for a while. Good Morning America reported that she had always wondered whether she could do it, and NPR reported that her family encouraged her to go after a record.

Randy, the Husband Who Heard She Was Done

The Huntsman World Senior Games said the plank ran from 3:03 p.m. to 8:03 p.m. Mountain time, with judges rotating in and out every hour, Good Morning America reported. A hold of that length is checked in shifts, so the person watching at hour five is not the one who started the clock.

The middle of the attempt was not the hardest part. Wilde told NPR she hit a wall at 4 hours, 30 minutes, the same length as her previous record. At one point she considered stopping and told her husband, Randy, that she was done, Good Morning America reported.

She kept going because of the people watching. With 10 to 15 minutes left, the games’ CEO, Kyle Case, led the crowd in cheering over the microphone, NPR reported, and Wilde credited that with getting her through. Good Morning America said the crowd chanted her through the final 10 minutes.

In the TODAY report, Wilde called the last half hour harder than she had ever thought it would be, and said the crowd’s cheering through the final minutes carried her. That report said video of the plank had passed 9 million views by Oct. 18.

Randy, 63, is also a fitness enthusiast, the same report noted. The next morning, according to Good Morning America, Wilde ran a 3,000-meter race.

DonnaJean, the Record Holder Waiting on Guinness

Coverage of the plank has described it in different ways. Good Morning America reported that Guinness was reviewing the attempt, while the TODAY report called it a world record without mentioning a review. On Nov. 1, Guinness’s own listing still showed the 2024 time, and no Guinness decision on the five-hour hold had been reported in the coverage from Oct. 6 onward. Until that decision is announced, the five hours are best described as a completed attempt under review.

Wilde is a teacher, NPR reported, and she told the program she wants people to find something they love and keep repeating it. She has a track record of doing exactly that, one long session at a time.

She has other records in view. Wilde already holds a Guinness record for the most push-ups by a woman in one hour, 1,575, and Good Morning America said she hopes to reach at least 1,600. In the TODAY report she said she was unsure about trying to break her planking record again, and named the push-up record as the more likely target.

For now, the plank stands as 300 minutes held in front of a crowd in St. George, Utah, with Rose’s training sessions behind it and a Guinness review still ahead.

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This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.

Image: Jaykayfit – CC BY-SA 3.0/Wikimedia Commons