Dan "The Plank" McCarthy

Friday morning we trudged into the office, in the gloomy chill of a Post-Christmas January hangover, ready to get the last bits of work done on our first week back. Heads forward, eyes focused. Then Jo (see: Business Development / Party Starting) bounded in!

"Dan! You have to plank and I have to get a picture of it because you can beat everyone on ITV and look at this woman who sent in a picture of her doing it in her pyjamas you can definitely beat her you plank for like 9 minutes and we can all be on TV if we send a picture of a company plankoff!" Jo said, or something like it, with minimal interrupting breaths.

That morning Jo had seen the Plank-Off Challenge on ITV's Good Morning Britain, in support of their "Eat More, Lose More" diet plan. Informatiq/ERS folks regularly take advantage of their subsidized gym memberships and longer "gym lunch" breaks, so she expected a bunch of us to pounce on the plank idea.

But again, it was Friday morning, so after some humming and hawing, a few brave volunteers decided to get involved and immediately discussed strategy:

And then they were off! I started shaking in the first 10 seconds, as I jealously side-eyed our Commercial Director Dan, cool as a cucumber, planking to my right. Stealing glances every couple seconds to see if Jo had gotten the shot yet, I breathed against gravity trying to humiliate me in front of my colleagues. 

Suddenly I heard giggling/cackling to my right. In dove Gary (see: Head of Engineering / Head of Snark), shouting something about sabotage, to throw his plank in the ring!

The giggling now too much for us to stay up, we all collapsed, leaving Dan to continue the challenge by himself. With a planking record of 7min 20seconds, the rest of us sheepishly went back to our desks to catch our breath.

Happy Friday!