The Best (Worst) Bike Videos to Watch on Acid

Sixty-nine years ago today, Albert Hofmann went on a bike ride.

Three days prior, the Swiss scientist inadvertently ingested enough lysergic acid diethylamide – a substance he’d first synthesized in late 1938 – to crack his brain open to the first shimmers of a strange and terrifying and beautiful trip. Curious, he wanted to know more.

So on April 19, 1943, with a trip-sitting lab attendant at his side, Hofmann dropped a much higher dosage of LSD. You know, just to see where the winds would take him. Soon enough he panicked, at which point his trusty aid seated the good doctor on a bike, and set him on course for home. The rest is history. Bicycle Day was born.

In that spirit, and because I can almost guarantee that there are more of you reading this who didn’t (or don’t plan to) actually drop and ride a bike today than those that did, below is your chance to hoist one up to the ’Hof from the comfort and safety of that plush new ergonomically-optimized swivel chair.

These are either the greatest bike videos to watch with a headful of LSD, or the worst. I’m not sure.

This announcer is on seven tabs.

Oh, god.

Oh, god, towering unicycles.

I was going to say something stupid about this being some sort of metaphor for your brain rapidly elevating. But that’s dumb. This just rules. I want a rocket bike.

This buck will open-field ram your ass into the baddest of terror trips AND HE DOESN’T EVEN CARE.

Get outta the Serengeti. Chump.

Now you’re coming down.

You’re welcome / I’m sorry.

• Albert Hofmann and the Greatest Discoveries of LSD
• We Still Don’t Really Know How Bikes Work
• Here’s A Bike You Can Run On
• Richard Doyle Q+A: How Psychedelics Help Us Evolve

Reach this writer at brian@motherboard.tv. @TheBAnderson