While sifting through the world record book, he spotted the record for marathon running while simultaneously flipping a pancake. The record for the 26 mile, 385 yard race was 3 hours, 6 minutes and 48 seconds. Thus began the career of the soon to be famous Pancake Man. Taking on the role of a scientist, The Pancake Man had to figure out how to accomplish this feat.
Experimenting with pancakes right off the grill failed due to them being fragile. Eventually, The Pancake Man figured out that if he microwaved two pancakes and held them together with Saran Wrap and contact glue he had a flapjack that could survive the 26+ mile run. This also fulfilled the requirement that the pancakes had to weigh at least two ounces to be considered for a world record.
A second component in breaking the record is that his frying pan to had to weigh at least one and a half pounds. The Pancake Man uses a regular frying pan, with a metal washer affixed to the bottom side of the pan. In 1987, The Pancake Man ran his first pancake-flipping marathon in Erie, Pennsylvania. And after only five attempts, in May of 1990, he broke the world record by 26 seconds. Most importantly, The Pancake Man would raise money for charity with each race he ran.
He eventually broke the record again, 17 marathons later on October 24, 1999 with a time of 3:02:27 at Niagara Falls, Ontario. Over the years, The Pancake Man started to gather a lot of attention from the media, race fans along the course and sponsors. During most of his races, the attention isn’t always given to the winners, but to that crazy guy who flips pancakes for the entire race. He appeared on “The Tonight Show” with Jay Leno, worked with Muhammad Ali at a fun-run for children in Los Angeles and he’s met and worked with many other celebrities along the way.
In 2008, Mike focused on breaking a second pancake-related record. This time around, he set his sights on the “highest pancake flip.” Following a succesfull first attempt at 24 feet, Mike’s record was quickly broken by a rival flipper. In 2010 at the Walden Galleria Mall in Buffalo, New York, Mike again broke the record with a monumental flip of 31 feet, one inch. He still holds both the fastest pancake marathon and highest pancake flip records to this day.