ONE WHEEL.
ONE WAY.
ONE SHOT AT HISTORY
ATTEMPTING A NEW WORLD RECORD LONG DISTANCE WHEELIE ON A MOTORCYCLE
(front wheel spinning)
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One Wheel. One Way. One Shot.
THE RECORD
Current Guiness Record
MY TARGET
(no alterations to bike)
(bike altered to maintain a spinning front wheel)
205.7
MILES
250 +
MILES
Countdown is estimated until a site and date have been approved
Built, tested, and dialed in for one purpose.
THE BIKE
Hours of labor to achieve one goal.
PREPARATION
PREPARATION
Prepping a motorcycle for a long distance wheelie involves making sure the machine is dependable. Equally important is the ability to maintain control and balance of the machine. To do that, the front wheel needs to spin to create the gyro effect. After a lot of research, I found a small 24 volt motor used in electric scooters that has a good amount of torque and is small and lightweight. I chose a lithium battery to run it and performed a no-load test to see just how long the battery and motor would hold up. The no-load test for the battery was just over 22 hours and the motor held up fine. It got pretty warm so I purchased a heat sink for it.
My next step is to engineer a drum of sorts that I'll mount where the front brake rotor bolts to the wheel. We'll use a small RC wheel with an 8mm axle bore to spin the drum/wheel combination. Once I have that figured out, I'll perform a full load test to see if the battery and motor will spin the wheel for at least 8 hours. If I can average 40 MPH for 250 miles it'll take 6.25 hours to complete the attempt. I found out that I can generate 12VDC from the bike adding a capacitor and voltage regulator, but the high torque motor I chose is 24 volt. Plan A is the 24VDC setup.
LATER: After lots of thought, planning and measuring I decided against a drum/wheel drive setup and have used a thick plexiglass to use in place of the front brake rotor and it's driven by a polyurethane belt. Watch the video to see how I accomplished it. It works so well that I stopped the test run after thirteen hours of continuous running! The only issue I had with it was the belt had nearly separated where I had welded it together. I'll do a better job of that next time.
The Rules
When I first researched what was the longest wheelie on a motorcycle was in Guiness World Records and found the record to be 205.7 miles I thought that was all I needed to know. Anyone who has performed a wheelie knows what that is...pop it up on the rear wheel and go. That's a wheelie. Add a motor for control and balance? We'd think yeah, that's a 'wheelie' just with more control. I was wrong.
One of the many "rules" for this record states "Modifications are not permitted for this attempt". That means you cannot use a motor to spin the front wheel for balance and control. "Yasuyuki Kudo covered 331km (205.7miles) non-stop on the rear wheel of his Honda TLM220R motorcycle at the Japan Automobile Research Institute proving ground, Tsukuba, near Tsuchiura, Japan on May 5, 1991."
It's pretty amazing that Yasuyuki did that without the front wheel spinning because we all know that once it stops, the bike wants to fall over either to the left or right. A TLM220R is just a little over 200 lbs and the bike I've chosen is around 240. At sixty-seven-years-old I know I can't physically muscle the bike for that distance.
Now, there are two wheel drive motorcycles and I thought maybe that was a solution. From what I gathered the front will not spin except if it's on the ground. To make it spin up in the air would be considered a 'modification'. I could be wrong on that because I've never driven one and the cost was too much anyway. Besides, I was dead set on using a motor to spin the front wheel anyway because I plan to use the same bike for wheelie shows, parades and the like as practice leading up to and after the attempt. What can I say...I'm hard headed that way. So right away I applied for a new record that specifically states 'with front wheel assist' and am waiting on Guiness World Records (GWR) to respond. FYI - you can't speak to anyone at GWR - emailing is their way to correspond. As of May 23, 2026, now July 9th...I'm waiting for their response/approval.
THE CHALLENGE
I'm finding that locating a venue to perform the attempt is pretty difficult. I've been turned down by several locations and totally ignored by others. Maybe they mistakenly think performing a wheelie is death defying? I'm still scouting places here in Texas. There's a proving ground in west Texas that wants $25k per day! That ones out for sure.
Riding on one wheel in that position for six plus hours is going to take a toll but that's the whole point. It should be difficult. Otherwise, why not just sit on the porch and watch the squirrels. I expect to use every ounce of energy I have to get this done. I look forward to this day. God willing, I'm gonna make it.
THE BIKE
I can't really tell you why I chose a KTM other than the fact I'm a fan of orange. I looked high and low trying to find a Yamaha 125 like I had back in the day but they were either on the other side of the country or too expensive. In my opinion, the older bikes look better and have cushion in the seat.
This is a 2008 200XC dirt bike. Not street legal, so it wasn't equipped with a condenser and voltage regulator. This was affordable at the time but it came with a few issues. One of the radiators had an amateur repair so I have all new radiators and hoses here in the shop to replace it. The subframe was broken from a spill someone took and I found a used replacement on ebay. The throttle cable, a few nuts and bolts, and a kickstand and it's ready. As of June 2026, I'm engineering a bracket for the motor and designing a drum to keep the front wheel spinning. Not sure yet what the balance point of this bike is so stay tuned because I'm posting a video of the first wheelies on it. July update: The front wheel motor and pulley is complete and tested. See the video on how I did it here.