@theventure: We only post about the world's greatest entrepreneurs! Peter Beck tested his first rocket engines by riding them. At 17 he chose an apprenticeship as a toolmaker, because precision metalwork is what a rocket engine needs. He started building engines the day he arrived, and his employer gave him titanium and wrote it off as apprentice training. He had no test stand to measure thrust. So he built a rocket bike, lay flat on it with the fuel bottles between his legs, and rode it. Around 2000 he ran it down a street in Dunedin. It hit 140 km/h in under five seconds, and the brake pads melted. Photos of those engines were the only qualification he took to America. He still owns the bike, and says it still works. Follow @theventure for the greatest founder stories ever told!

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Thursday 15 October 2026 19:03:20 GMT