The Guinness World Record for the longest distance traveled by motorcycle in 24 hours belongs to Italian Iván Cervantes, who beat the old record by more than 600 km (370 mi) on July 9, 2024, at an average speed of 167.79 km/h (104.26 mph).
Five-time Enduro World Champion and Triumph Global Ambassador Cervantes rode the Triumph Tiger 1200 GT Explorer for 4,012.53 km (2,493.27 mi), breaking the previous world record of 3,406 km (2,116.39 mi) set by American Carl Reese on February 26, 2017 at an average speed of 141.9 km/h. Reese held the record for nearly six years before Cervantes named him.
Reese, meanwhile, also held the famed “Cannonball” LA-to-NYC solo motorcycle record from 2015 to 2019; despite notaries at the start and finish line to verify his time of 39 hours and 49 minutes, Guinness has long refused to keep records in categories it deems dangerous and illegal.
While Reese set the 2017 record by sleeping just four hours in a 24-hour period, Cervantes took no sleep breaks to claim the title. Apparently, if you sleep, you really do lose.
Victory
The bike used for the Guinness World Record was randomly selected from Triumph's factory production line in Hinckley, England. Apart from an initial service before the bike was ridden and tested, no other modifications were made to the bike. Not only that, the bike only needed a scheduled tire change midway through the test when the stock Metzeler Tourance tires were swapped out.
This is good advertising for Metzeler; Reese burned two front and four rear tires during his record attempt; they were Continental's Road Attack 2 EVO GTs.
The world record was set on the High Speed Ring at the Nardò Technical Center in Italy, where Cervantes not only broke the old record, but did so by nearly five hours, covering a total distance greater than the distance from Los Angeles to New York as the crow flies.
Cervantes is a five-time Enduro World Champion, winning 21 Spanish Enduro Championships and five Spanish Motocross Championships. He has also topped competitions such as the Baja Aragón, 1000 Dunas Raid and Basella Maxi-Trail Race. In July 2021, he was named one of Triumph’s Off-Road Ambassadors, helping develop the next range of enduro and motocross motorcycles.
Cervantes worked closely with Professor Andrew Bagshaw from the University of Birmingham to properly structure his diet and sleep schedule ahead of his record attempt, even using his own Tiger 1200 Rally Pro to prepare for the feat. But it’s clear that no amount of training can fully prepare you for 24 hours of riding in circles at high speeds without any sleep.
Victory
“It's not easy to cycle for 24 hours straight but in the end, this amazing bike is my record,” Cervantes said. Apparently, he was accelerating the bike with his left hand to reduce stiffness and physical strain, allowing the right side of his body to recover.
Diving into the details, Cervantes completed a total of 317 laps of the track, each lap measuring 12.649 km (7.86 miles). He reached speeds of over 200 km/h (124 mph) and used a total of 520 liters (137 gallons) of fuel in the attempt. He made only 18 pit stops in the entire 24-hour period.
Things have come a long way, literally, since 2009, when Omani Omar Al Mamari became the first person to break a Guinness World Record in this category. He rode his Honda CBR 1100 for a total of 2,062 km (1,281 miles) at an average speed of 94.1 km/h (58.5 mph).
Source: Guinness World Records