It's a pet belief of mine that Guinness World Records are a 'scam'. The big sporting records, like fastest 100 m sprint, are actually tracked by the sports bodies. What say they have in the matter is its own debate (e.g. there's no record for the 150 m, because the IAAF don't sanction a 150 m race, but there was a famous unsanctioned race between winners of the 100 m and 200 m races), particularly in sports with multiple federations or codes, but at least they sometimes have international government funding from which to derive some kind of authority.

GWR have nothing but a tacky book, yet we've all been sucked into this notion that it's not an official world record unless they say it is. And what they accept as a record is subject to strict guidelines (i.e. what they're willing to put in a child's Christmas stocking) and dubious rulesets. There are even unbreakable 'first xyz' records and geographically limited 'world' records.