This man has the world’s longest tongue – here’s what he can do with it

Let’s face it, people break records for some pretty bizarre reasons.

Last week, a man from Solihull managed to build the world’s tallest M&M tower (spoiler: it was surprisingly small), and now a 20-year-old from India has been crowned the person with the longest tongue.

K Praveen, from Tamil Nadu, has been inducted into his country’s Book of Records thanks to his whopping 10.8cm-long organ.

The current Guinness World Records title-holder is Nick Stoeberl, from California. His tongue was measured at 10.1cm in 2012 – meaning Praveen trumps him by a comfortable margin.

To put that all into context, the human tongue is, on average, 8.5cm long for men and 7.9cm for women, according to the University of Edinburgh. In other words, Praveen can do a lot more than touch the tip of his nose with his impressive specimen.

In fact, the 20-year-old can actually squish his whole nose down (well, the fleshy part at least), with it and almost touch his eye.

He can also hide it in his naval cavity – a prank which he calls the “invisible tongue”, according to Times Now News – and use it like a brush to draw and write letters.

In addition, he is one of very few people who can lick his elbow without being double-jointed. So, all in all, we’re impressed.

The reason Praveen has not yet seen his name etched into the Guinness World history books is due to a lack of funds, according to local media. He is now trying to raise money so that he can show off his achievements globally.

In doing so, he would knock Stoeberl off his platform nine years after he snatched the title from Coventry man Stephen Taylor, who set the previous record at 9.8cm in 2002.

Here’s a video of Stoeberl talking to Guinness about his unique accolade:

In 2011, the then 21-year-old appeared on ‘America’s Got Talent’, attempting to win over the judges by using his tongue as a paintbrush.

To be fair, he managed to create a relatively discernible picture of a plant within seconds, but it all proved too much for the judges to swallow.

His skills were met with a resounding four no’s from Howie Mandel, Mel B, Heidi Klum and Simon Cowell. But at least he won the World Record a year later.

America’s Got Talent

Now, it looks as though it’s time to give another young tongue-master his time in the sun.