I was blown away. I may have been the one setting the world record but I’m not sure who was more impresses: me or the audience. This was the most spectacular production around a Guinness World Record I have ever experienced.
Today I broke my 36th Guinness World Record in Hsinchu City, Taiwan at the Pei-Ying Junior High School in front of over 200 people who came in on their holiday to help and watch the “MIT Smart Student at Pei-Ying Junior High” festivities. The record attempt was for the furthest distance trekked on foot balancing a bicycle on the chin. The previous mark was just over 20 meters.
The program kicked off with a national award-winning student band, introductions of the dignitaries including one from the Hsinchu City Mayor’s office, and an overview of the feat I was about to attempt. I then placed the bicycle saddle on my chin and began the walk across the 28-meter-long basketball floor (measured the day before by professional surveyors to be less than 1:1000 slope). Less than a minute later I passed the 20-meter mark as half the crowd cheered and the other half tried to shush the first half, and then continued to the end of the court. Being careful to keep the bicycle safely balanced on my chin, I then turned around and headed back. I made it to the start point and turned around and went back and forth again and again for 6 total passes across the gym floor. The end total was 168.76 meters in 4 minutes 22 seconds. My neck was on fire and I was getting wobbly that point, so I was happy to remove the bicycle from my chin.
We then took photos. Lots of photos. So many photos I wanted to take my camera out and take a photo of everyone taking photos (I regret not doing this).
I then presented the giant $5,500 USD donation to the school made by Mark in my name (thank you!) and then delivered my first inspirational speech with a live translation into another language. It felt very natural to have a speech translated other than the connection to the audience followed a few seconds after I said the words. The translation was done by the school English teacher and went very smooth.
My speech was not only translated live but also printed in Mandarin and available for the multiple news stations present. There was a giant sign hailing the “MIT Smart Student” talk by David Rush.
At least 7 news organizations showed up and 15 or so covered the event. If you’d like a fun read you can have Google translate auto-translate them for you.😊
Storm Media, Life News, Techlife, GreatNews,
SinaNews, Yam, TWPowerNews,
PChome News, Hinet News, Atanews
Mark then added his comments to help inspire these students (he’s a big supporter of the entire community).
Special thanks to Mark, Rex, Pei-Ying school and teachers, the Junior High School principal and all the people who helped support this event from sourcing the bike to printing signs, the Hsinchu City Mayor’s Office, the principals of multiple schools, the videographers, photographers, and other volunteers! Your help was very much appreciated.
