After spending five hours in a bar, most people are ready to call it a night and head home.

Not Vince Amico.

After five hours of sitting in the dimly lit All-American Rathskeller, 108 S. Pugh St., Amico took a stroll into Saturday's mid-afternoon warmth and sunlight for a short break.

As his eyes adjusted to the brightness, Amico (senior-exercise and sports science) pulled a handful of bottlecaps from his jeans pocket, making sure not to spill any beer from the short green Rolling Rock bottle in his other hand, and began counting.

"They're just to have," Amico grinned as he spoke of his new souvenirs. "I didn't (save them) last year, so I did it this year," he added as he dropped two caps and stooped to pick just those two up from the ground, leaving several others untouched.

The bottlecaps are proof for Amico that he took part in the Rathskeller's annual case race --the bar's yearly attempt to break its own world record of 1,004 cases of beer sold in a single day in 1992.

The Guinness Book of World's Records doesn't include food and alcohol records anymore, so the case record is unofficial, said Pam Mowrer, the Skeller's bar manager. But no other bar has laid claim to the record, she added.

"It is (the record) as far as we know," Mowrer said, adding that the bar fell 53 cases short this year, ending with 951 cases sold.

The tradition of the case race began 13 years ago, Mowrer said. Each year on the Saturday after St. Patrick's Day -- or the weekend after that if St. Patrick's falls on Thursday or Friday -- the bar invites patrons to help break at least the State College record for cases of pony bottles sold in a day.

The practice of selling cases of pony (7 ounce) bottles began in the '60s, Mowrer said. Patrons would buy two bottles of Rolling Rock ponies for one price. As the bar got busier and larger groups came in, patrons grew tired of carrying armfuls of the short bottles and began buying cases at a time, "And the rest is history," she explained.

Logically, the case race has become one of the busiest days of the year for the Skeller. Customers lined up on Pugh Street around the corner on to College Avenue, knowing they would have to wait several hours to get into the bar to take part in the challenge.

"It's different from just going to a bar," Mowrer said. " It's a common goal -- people want to be part of it."

With the literally thousands of people drinking large amounts of beer, it would also seem logical that the bar experiences some problems with fighting among customers. But this rarely happens.

"It's one of the easiest days to work," Mowrer said. "There's no patron confrontations," she added, attributing the relative peacefulness to the common goal of the patrons.

The fact that the case race is a tradition draws many to the festivities, annually marked by a standing-room-only crowd -- even on the booths -- and the crunch of broken green glass underfoot.

"It's the Skeller, it's tradition to come here and drink," said Stefan Strauser (senior-health policy and administration). "If you don't climb Mount Nittany, if you don't go to football games, if you don't go to the Skeller -- you're not a Penn Stater."

Strauser waited in line for two hours before he finally got into the packed house at 11:30 Saturday morning. Two hours, however, was far from the longest amount of time spent in the line.

Amico spent 10 hours in line -- from 11 p.m. Friday until the bar opened at 9 a.m. Saturday -- to ensure that he would be what he called "numero uno," the very first customer to enter the bar.

Although some may not consider these actions rational, a sleepy Amico gave one simple excuse.

"I love the Skeller," he swore loyally. "I won't go anywhere else."