Whiffling toward a spot in the Guinness book

Norwich - After six hours of play, Red had scored more than 100 runs.

But Blue, with about 80, was keeping it interesting. With more than 20 hours or so to go, it was anybody's game.

Not that anyone cared about the score.

"That's just a formality," said Bobby DeAngelis, the Rutland, Vt., man who organized an attempt this weekend to play the World's Longest Wiffle Ball Game at Fontaine Field on Mahan Drive. The bid began around 9:30 a.m. Saturday, and the participants planned to play nonstop until about 1:30 p.m. today.

That would result in a 28-hour game - enough, DeAngelis said, to secure a listing in the Guinness Book of World Records.

"We're not worried about the score," DeAngelis, the 25-year-old manager of a publishing company, said. "The only thing that matters is the record. That's what people remember."

DeAngelis' band of record-seekers includes eight players - four to a team - and others who serve as umpires and witnesses, as required by Guinness.

"We've got to record everything on camera and keep a scorebook," DeAngelis said. "We'll send in pictures, video, newspaper clippings …"

DeAngelis' childhood friend, Jackie Turro, a Norwich resident who grew up in Rutland, was instrumental in securing the use of Fontaine Field.

Turro, director of development for Special Olympics Connecticut, served as a witness for DeAngelis' staging last year of the World's Longest Baseball Game in Barre, Vt., and saw the fundraising possibilities associated with such an event.

The Longest Baseball Game, which went on for 48 hours, 32 minutes, raised $2,500 for the Barre Recreation Department, DeAngelis said. The players raised the money by lining up sponsors who pledged donations and contributing themselves.

The DeAngelis family's Rutland Country Store helped sponsor the Longest Baseball Game project.

This weekend's whiffle ball game is being played in accordance with guidelines spelled out on the website www.wiffle.com. The dimensions of the field, number of players and just about everything else related to the game can be found there.

There's no running of bases and no walks. Singles, doubles, triples and home runs are determined by the zones into which pitches are batted. Cleanly fielded ground balls as well as those caught in the air constitute outs.

The rules allow a five-minute break every hour but DeAngelis said the plan was to forgo them in the interest of speeding things up. They'd set up tents so one team member at a time could sleep while 3-against-3 play continued overnight.

It seemed only a storm could prevent a new record from being set.

b.hallenbeck@theday.com