If you peeked your head in at the Polo Field in Golden Gate Park on October 20, you would’ve seen a few familiar faces on ridiculous vehicles. Usually the domain of soccer players and cyclists, the track was repurposed into a race course for electric vehicles being tested by Mythbusters’ Adam Savage, Simone Giertz (queen of shitty robots), Norm Chan and Jeremy Williams of Tested, and Will Smith, founder of FOO VR (not the star of I, Robot, sorry).
Together, this team was shooting lead-up footage for the Bay Area Science Festival. Their kindly crew let me snap a few pictures and generally make fun of all the racers.
Here’s a behind-the-scenes glance of what it takes to turn a test into a reality:
A roundup of the vehicles
Adam on a one-wheeled skateboard.
The board is self-balancing and moves when you lean forward. This is pretty intuitive, except for the part where you have to lean forward at high speed and get over your fear of gravity. The aforementioned fundamental force tends to tip the board forward and launch the rider off, much like a nosediving snowboard.
In Adam’s own words, “This took me weeks to get this right — I can only stop using the Savage skid.”
Not to spoil too much, but despite this precautionary measure, Adam still managed to take a savage skid later.
Jeremy on an electric longboard
Jeremy is the only rider who managed to stay on his vehicle at all times — good news for San Franciscans who use an electric skateboard as their primary mode of transportation.
Norm on a short Segway
This augmented Segway goes about as slowly as you’d imagine and looks even dorkier in person. Norm also brought two drones to film the action.
Will Smith on an electric unicycle
Apparently, the key to mastering this contraption is to “thrust your pelvis forward.” It auto-balances forward and back for you, eliminating the most difficult part of unicycle riding. “It’s so easy, a baby could do it,” Will said. I’m going to guess he was being sarcastic, because when I tried, I failed miserably.
When he screamed, “If I die, tell my wife and kid I love them,” I realized he might have been joking.
I’m not allowed to share Simone’s vehicle, because it’s a secret. But it lived up to the promise of shitty robot–hood.
Lead-Up
With the racers queued up and ready to go, one last conundrum remained — these vehicles do not travel at comparable velocities, so how would they stage a race? To ensure that the race was “fair,” each contestant was given a start signal at a different time. These stagger times were calculated on the basis of the max speeds of the vehicles as well as the length of the track.
However, what seemed like a great idea ended up not really working, as none of our intrepid racers actually reached max speed. The Segway started losing juice immediately, and the unicycle was impossible to stay upright on.
The rules of the race to “The Last Mile”:
Rule 1: Stay on your vehicle at all times.
Rule 2: Do not knock anyone off their vehicle.
Rule 3: There are no rules.
The Race
A play-by-play of what followed.
Race to “The Last Mile,” take 1: Simone’s vehicle takes off, swerves and immediately face-plants into the fence. Norm moves next, going exceptionally slowly on his Segway, followed by Will, who flails wildly. Adam darts forward, followed by Jeremy on his skateboard. Ten minutes later, and all our contestants have cleared the finish line.
Amid a round of applause, the crew realizes they’ve forgotten to put a GoPro on any of the racers. In layman’s terms, they have no POV footage. After a few minutes of sizing up filming assets, the team realizes the Go Pro isn’t charged. Also, the track isn’t even a mile long. It’s a single kilometer, which translates to roughly two-thirds of a mile.
Race to “The Last Mile,” take 2: Simone’s vehicle scuttles forth at the speed of an inchworm. Norm scoots away at an ever-diminishing pace, holding an iPhone to capture his competitors (whom he knows will lap him). He moves a few feet and then falls over horizontally and rather undramatically. There goes the footage.
Will’s finesse on the unicycle seems to have improved, but then he suddenly swerves in the opposite direction of the curve and spills onto the bleachers. His palms, knuckles and knee sustain scrapes, which are remedied with Bactine. The crew lugs the unicycle back to the starting line.
Adam weaves past the carnage and increases pace to ensure a first-place finish. But far before he makes it to the finish line, he tips too far forward and launches himself onto the pavement. The team rushes to him with a first aid kit procured from the referee’s Lexus. This may be the first and final time a Lexus first aid kit is ever used.
Adam’s injuries are minor compared to the catalogue of wounds from a decades-long career as a myth buster. The gravest victim is Adam’s bomber jacket, which sustains a tear from wrist to elbow.
Jeremy whizzes by, unfazed, going on to win what is likely the easiest race of his life.
Final Remarks
This was probably not solid science. Lessons learned? Always wear a helmet. Also, movie magic is real.
The Bay Area Science Festival kicks off on October 27 and goes until November 5! If you want to see who won the race (the first take, at least), hang out with Adam Savage or meet awesome humans who love making things—we gotchu. Tested the Show: Journeys is happening on October 29, from 7:oo to 10:00 p.m., at the Castro Theatre. I’ll be there!
And if you can’t make it, here’s a video of Adam making a Totoro costume in a single day. And a video of Simone getting smacked in the face by an alarm-clock robot of her own creation.
Photos from Peter Bartelme.
