Over the years we have seen more than one Guinness record that has truly surprised us. However, it has recently been awarded to Venkata Karthik Tupilian Indian enthusiast who loves two wheels and travel, stands out not only for the achievement itself, but also for the time it took to achieve it and the circumstances surrounding it.
According to the details on the official Guinness World Records website, Tupili has managed to make the longest motorcycle trip in a single country, carried out by a man. From February 14, 2022 to October 6, 2023, This Indian biker managed to travel 140,094.1 kilometers (87,050 miles) within his native India.
A Guinness record full of patriotism
As we have pointed out previously, this Guinness record is really striking, not only because of the long distance traveled along more than 450 days by Venkata riding his Royal Enfield Himalayan. The most curious thing about the whole thing is that he never had to cross the Indian border to enter any other country in the area.
Initially, he even planned to cover a distance of around 160,000 km, as his colleagues at New Atlas suggest. This distance is equivalent to going around the circumference of the planet Earth four times. Finally, he decided to stop at 140,000 km, a distance that already gave him the coveted Guinness record.
In the interview he gave to New Atlas he explains that: “I was born and brought up in Nellore, Andhra Pradesh, India. I have a degree in engineering and have worked as an assistant director on web series and films. I have also dabbled in art at some point in my life, so I am a multi-talented person.”
Regarding the trip he argues: “I had the idea of travelling all over India and a friend encouraged me to try to break a world record. Sure enough, I came across an article entitled ‘The Longest Motorcycle Trip in a Single Country’ and that’s when I grabbed a map and started planning.”
About the Guinness record: “I filled out an application to Guinness World Records, which was accepted. I then received a rule book that I had to abide by. By the way, it had about 40 pages of rules. I had to submit some documents as proof of the feat. It included proof of commercial availability, personal and witness records, witness statements, GPS data, photographic and video evidence, and newspaper articles.”
Concludes: “I ended up sending evidence of over 20,000 photos, over 5,000 videos, 458 GPS files, 458 witness letters, bike service invoices, newspaper articles, etc. I used over six terabytes to store my data.”
