World's largest pillow fight held in California at UC Irvine

IRVINE, Calif. -- More than 4,000 University of California-Irvine students showed up, pillows in hand, to get in on the world's largest pillow fight held on campus on Tuesday.

The sea of college students, mostly freshmen and incoming transfers, armed themselves with pillows and the hope of entering the Guinness World Record.

"It's amazing, and it's challenging, and I think it brings a lot of school spirit to everybody," transfer student Viviana Garcia said.

Classes for the Anteaters don't start until Thursday, but the mob was welcomed to campus with a tradition unlike any other.

"It was crazy. It was awesome seeing so many people out here to support UCI," freshman Xavier Dedenbach said.

Per Guinness rules, the pillow fight lasted 60 seconds. The previous record holder had 3,813 participants.

Student organizer Joshua Nguyen said the milestone comes in time for UCI's 50th anniversary.

"Just to set it off with another world record is really cool. It sets it up for future years to keep breaking world records like this," Nguyen said.

University officials said the school owns two other world records, including the world's largest dodgeball game and water gun fight.

"I'm pretty excited. It took all summer to plan this, so I'm really glad it paid off," Nguyen said.