Two French biking enthusiasts recently set a new Guinness World Record for the ‘tallest rideable bicycle’ by building a 7.77-meter (25 ft 5 in) behemoth that can (barely) be ridden.

Nicolas Barrioz and David Peyrou came up with the idea for the world’s tallest bicycle 5 years ago, while drinking at a pub, but they actually decided to go through with the project and spent months putting together a plan to make it work. Made from metal alloy, steel, and wood, the unique bike took hundreds of hours to complete in a way that made it rideable, even for a short distance. It may not seem like a challenge, but building a 25-foot rideable bicycle is definitely not as easy as riding a bike. For example, the pedals are connected to the wheels via a 16-meter (53-ft) chain, and because of its extreme height, the bicycle has to move at a speed of around 15-20 km/h (9-12 mph) for the rider to maintain balance.

The world’s tallest rideable bicycle has a saddle, two standard-sized wheels, and a handlebar complete with two brake levers, only the distance between the wheels and the saddle is about seven meters. The gigantic frame between the saddle and the wheels is mostly made of wood from discarded furniture, as the duo behind the project believe that the material will replace alloy in a few decades, because of mineral scarcity.

“Wood is an interesting material from an ecological perspective,” Nicolas said. “In my opinion, it will replace alloy in bicycle-frame construction in a few decades because of mineral shortages.”

David and Nicolas spent about two years building their record-breaking bicycle and decided to unveil it to the world in the city of Clermont-Ferrand, during an annual bicycle festival. To prove that it worked, one of them had to ride it unassisted over a distance of 100 meters, which proved quite tricky. David was the rider, and he wore a harness attached to a zip wire for safety.

Getting the bicycle to the required speed to maintain balance was the tricky part and a short video shows just how unstable the handlebars were in David’s hands as he was trying to keep the 7.7-meter-tall bicycle from crashing down. Luckily, once he got some speed, the ride became smoother, and the duo smashed the old record for the tallest rideable bicycle by 36 centimeters.

 

“The speed of the bike was the key to its stability,” Nicolas told Guinness Records.