Longer [Than] - Random Trivia Answers

• A1) McGwire's homers. McGwire launched his 70 homers a total of 29,598 feet, while the top of Mount Everest is 29,029 feet up.
• A2) Tour de France. Although the distance varies, the cyclists usually cover over 1,800 miles, while the Iditarod is currently 1,151 miles.
• A3) Soccer goal. A soccer goal is 24 feet wide and 8 feet high, while NFL goalposts are 18.5 feet wide and 10 feet high. NCAA football used 23-foot, 4-inch goalposts until matching the NFL in 1991.
• A4) Swimming pool. The Olympics require a minimum depth of 6.6 feet (2 meters), while badminton nets top out at 5.1 feet (1.55 meters).
• A5) Baseball rubber to plate. The rubber is 60 feet, 6 inches from the plate, half a foot less than a bowling lane. The actual distances traveled by a baseball pitch to the front of home plate and by a bowling ball to the head pin are both shorter and depend on the players.
• A6) Basketball court. NCAA and NBA courts are 50 feet wide, FIBA courts are 45.9 feet wide, and tennis courts are 36 feet wide (27 feet for singles). Basketball courts are also longer (94, 84, and 85.3 feet) than tennis courts (78 feet).
• A7) Table tennis table. Both are 9 feet long, but ping pong tables are half a foot wider at 5 feet.
• A8) 24-hour run. Yiannis Kouros of Greece ran 188.6 miles in a single day, while the Ironman Triathlon consists of a 2.4-mile swim, 112-mile bike ride, and a 26.2-mile marathon for a total of 140.6 miles.
• A9) CFL. CFL fields measure 160 yards long, with extra-deep endzones (25 yards each) and an extra 10 yards between goal lines compared to the NFL's 120-yard field. Soccer fields can be from 100 to 130 yards long.
• A10) Belmont Stakes. The race in Elmont, New York covers one and half miles, a quarter mile more than the Kentucky Derby, which in turn is a sixteenth of a mile longer than the Preakness.
• A11) Javelin. Czech Jan Zelezny threw a javelin over 323 feet in May 1996. Russian Yuriy Sedykh launched a hammer 284.6 feet in August 1986, German Jurgen Schult spun a discus over 243 feet in June 1986, and American Randy Barnes pushed a shot put nearly 76 feet in May 1990.
• A12) Hammer. Russian Tatyana Lysenko set the hammer record of 255.25 feet in August 2006. East German Gabriele Reinsch tossed a discus almost 252 feet in July 1988, Cuban Osleidys Menendez flung a javelin 235.2 feet in August 2005, and Russian Natalya Lisovskaya heaved a shot put 74.25 feet in June 1987. You may have noticed that the women's discus record is farther than the men's record, but this is easily explained by the different weights used (1 kilogram vs. 2 kilograms).