speedrunning: a retrospective

please don't try this at home

I had threatened to do this for over a year now. It finally happened.

June 16, 2025: Harvy Chang, better known by his screen name Penguinaut, and I had concocted an awful plan for the morning. At 5:30 AM, we would both be at Santa Teresa LRT station, and would be riding trams for the next three-ish hours. Should everything go right, we would be at Winchester exactly two hours and fifty-five minutes later.

This route was identified by Bay Area Transit discord members over a year prior, but was decided (completely reasonably!) to be too early for anybody to do. It would take a speedrun madman, represented by our friend Penguinaut, to get this one done. He should be introduced to you like that guy from Moneyball.

Billy, this is Penguinaut. He speedruns for a living, but he’s got one flaw. He can’t get a record for the life of him.

Twenty-something attempts, all failures. This was different turf, but this would be his first ever WR if successful.

Early morning, we drove to Santa Teresa. Driving may be sacrilege, but we would do anything for the record — that sweet, sweet record. The prior best time was 3 hours 19 minutes, which we would, hopefully, easily beat. The problem with our run, though, were a negative minute transfer at Alum Rock, and then after that, a 3 minute sprint from Diridon to San Fernando station.

But here we were. Perhaps the dumbest people on public transportation today, or somewhere nearing the most insane.

Our first train to Baypointe was smooth. We got to know each other ahead of the brilliant backdrop of the sun rising over Mount Hamilton. As our tram barreled down Guadalupe Parkway, spirits were high, if not a bit tense. We, along with our ground crew on Discord (thanks tonsi!), were watching the tram vehicle that would have to make our Alum Rock transfer for. A quick transfer at Baypointe later, we were on the Orange Line.

Our early excitement quickly subsided into pure nerves. Would we be lucky enough, would our tram be early enough, would the opposite tram be late enough?

We pull into Alum Rock, and the tram on the opposite track is still there. As our door opens, though, the opposite tram’s bell rings. The doors are closed. The tram is moving. And that was it.

There was, though, one more surprise in store for us. The tram never left, but just pulled up some twenty meters to the front of the platform. Scream divine intervention all you want — the negative transfer had been conquered. To this day, we do not know if this maneuver was scheduled and normal or not. Surely it was. Surely this transfer would have been made any day without the grace of the operator.

But no matter. Spirits high again, we weaved our way through the office parks of Sunnyvale. Our next move would be Caltrain to Diridon, and we had another potential trick up our sleeve. We could never get enough of the chase, and anxiously tracked an earlier local train out of Mountain View that would hopefully take us to Diridon early enough that we would not need to do our sprint transfer.

We missed that train. But it never mattered anyways. A ten minute transfer at Mountain View later, and we were off. Now is a good time to confess to you, reader, that I am not a good runner. Penguinaut is. His speedruns, traditionally, rely heavily on transfers by foot. I do not do speedruns. Do you see where this is going?

We make it to Diridon a few minutes early, just like Penguinaut had planned out on his terrifying planning spreadsheet. And we are off. Sprinting out of the station, I quickly lose my footing and slow down. With thanks again to the grace of the operator for taking pity on my slow soul, we make our San Fernando transfer.

By this point, I am broken. I haven’t run this much in months. I am not built for this. I spend the entire Green Line segment holding back vomit and nursing a headache, and once we get to Winchester, our post-run celebration is limited by the fact I am just in excruciating pain. I lay down at Winchester for a solid 40 minutes before getting back up.

But we did it. No matter how stupid it looked, no matter how much it took, a win’s a win. Our time was even faster than anticipated; our last train had arrived at Winchester three minutes early. We had comfortably broken the record, and our ground crew begun calling our run potentially unbeatable.

I am never doing this again. Please try to beat the record. I challenge you. Or at least wait two years until I’m in university and I can put this on my resume, then beat the record.

Thanks a lot. Thanks to the ground crew for being there the whole time and checking timetables and transfers for us. And, of course, a thank you and congratulations to my friend for getting his first ever speedrun record. He deserves it so much more than any of us do.