Florida man fails latest attempt to run to New York or Bermuda in self-made floating bubble thing
Reza Baluchi has made headlines in the past for his other attempts to run places in a big plastic ball
Reza “Ray” Baluchi is an inveterate dreamer. For years now, the Florida ultramarathon runner and inventor has been trying to combine his passions by getting into a floating hamster ball contraption and running across the water from his home state to Bermuda or New York. In each case, he hasn’t made it very far.
His latest attempt involved freaking out people who were trying to enjoy a day at the beach on Florida’s east coast last Saturday; he drifted ashore after a failed attempt to run to either New York or Bermuda. The Guardian reports that Baluchi was brought back to land after he realized “that some of his safety and navigation equipment had been stolen” and the coast guard were notified of his floating balloon thing’s progress. In his attempt to head North, Baluchi made it only 30 miles south of his starting point.
Over on his YouTube channel, Baluchi advertised his planned trip to Bermuda last September with an early ‘00s-style video. In it, spy movie graphics and dramatic military music are overlaid on clips of him running in his floating hamster ball, a rotating view of the Earth from space, and snippets of text like, “Run With Reza,” “Greatest Guinness World Records Most Dangerous Place In World,” “It’s Happen Soon Travel To Bermuda,” and “Lorem Ipsum Has Been The Industry’s Standard Dummy Text Ever Since The 1500s.”