Tinuke Oyediran: The British-Nigerian who broke two Guinness World Records in skating

Tinuke Oyediran broke two Guinness World Records. She achieved the most cartwheels on roller skates for one minute with 30 and most spins on e-skates with 70 in one minute.

“I feel very overwhelmed and very happy and very excited. The cartwheel one was pretty harcore because every time I do a cartwheel, I only do it on one side, my favourite side. The roller skates weigh about 1.5kg each. That’s an extra 3kg on top of my body weight on one arm for a whole minute.” 

Her roller skating career started in the show, ‘Starlight Express’. She learned how to skate during the two years she performed. She only decided to train for the record during the lockdown in the UK.

“It’s really hard to practice because I can only do it once a week. It puts me in so much pain afterwards.”

“I was quite nervous on the day because I had only practiced it the week before. I used my one hour of exercise a day practicing these cartwheels, practicing these spins,” she added.

Though if it wasn’t for a passing statement her mother made, Tinuke Oyediran, perhaps wouldn’t have thought to try out in the attempt to break the record.

“I think it was my mum who said, ‘this is actually quite a lot, maybe you should check if this is a world record and I did and it was.”

“It’s the best delivery [package] I’ve ever had,” Tinuke exclaimed. “As a kid I used to read the Guiness World Record books so to now be in it, it’s definitely a dream come true.”

She was born in London but spent every summer in Nigeria. She has so far received an immense amount of support from the African country.

“The love that I have got from Nigeria, the support, the pride and everything, it’s just been so lovely. It really put me in touch with needing to go back home and perform there and see my family over that side.”

Tinuke also teaches people how to roller skate and how to get fit through an online fitness programme which is available across the continent.

For young Africans she has one small advice: “just go for it. Never never hold back.”

“I didn’t want to let this lockdown hold me back. I didn’t want to let the coronavirus hold me back. So I just tried. I just started in my pyjamas in my bedroom and thought ‘let me see how many I can do’. The sky’s the limit, it really is.”