Viral video inspires another world record for flexible Liberty Barros and human statue

Flexible record holder Liberty Barros teamed up with living statue Valentin Ursu (both UK) to recreate one of their viral moments – and this time, make it a world record.

The duo racked up millions of views on Instagram with a video of them playing tricks on each other in London’s Trafalgar Square.

In the funny clip, Liberty jumps up on to Valentin’s golden plinth while he’s standing with his back to her and bends herself into a position that resembles a chair.

Valentin, who is legally blind, sits back and Liberty cheekily rolls out of the way, only to be left scratching her head when Valentin stays in position, floating there, and even crosses his legs to get more comfortable.

“The world’s most flexible girl @libertybarros trying to trick the Goldman,” Valentin captioned the video.

Inspired by that, the pair recently stopped by Guinness World Records HQ in London to team up for a record attempt.

Together, they claimed the title for longest handstand on a person performing a levitation trick with an impressive 1 min 29.35 sec.

Liberty, who dressed the part for the day in a gold outfit to match Valentin’s, said: “As soon as we met, to be honest, the main thing was we really connected as people.

“We fully knew we could create some amazing things together, amazing performances.

“And today is a really, really exciting day, to be able to do this with Valentin and his family.”

Guinness World Records Adjudicator Emma Salt was on hand to oversee the record attempt.

She explained that Liberty had to balance with her hands on Valentin’s lap, without the use of any balancing aid.

While her body didn’t have to remain completely straight, her hands had to stay in contact with her record partner the entire time.

The minimum to beat was 30 seconds.

As the attempt began, Liberty leapt into position and held herself up in upside down splits while balancing her hands on Valentin’s knees, while he leaned back in his levitation trick.

When she couldn’t hold on any more, she jumped down on to the floor, landing in splits and fist-pumping the air.

“Let’s go, Valentin!” she excitedly exclaimed as they celebrated with an elaborate high-five routine.

Emma confirmed it was a valid attempt, and that they’d almost tripled the minimum time they had to hold the position.

In true Liberty style, the 17-year-old flipped across the floor to collect her official Guinness World Records certificate, bending over backwards to pass it to Valentin before collecting her own.

After smashing the record, Valentin told us: “My journey into live performance has loads of sad moments, so I will try to avoid those because today’s a happy day and special for us.

“Mainly, I entered into street performance mainly due to my low vision at that time.

“Back in 2010, I was losing job after job so I had to find myself a way of living.

“And then as soon as I got in I understood that being a human statue on the streets is not a simple thing, it’s much more than that.

“I get to create moments with the audiences, with the people who come to visit me and they decide to take a picture or create a memory with me.

“They play a part of my life as well.”

After taking up his living statue act, Valentin went on to create his first floating trick before coming up with many more ideas.

He also found a home online, finding his videos made a huge impact, even before he teamed up with Liberty to make their viral video.

The duo are busy working on a new concept and could be back to break more records soon.

But they’re also aiming to get in front of a very particular audience.

“Our dream is to perform in front of the royal family,” Valentin confessed.

Liberty agreed: “We would love to perform for King Charles. That would be crazy.”

Liberty’s has a string of other records:

• The most splits in one minute - 42
• The fastest 20-m backbend knee-lock walk - 22.53 seconds
• The most extreme back bend push ups in 30 seconds (female) - 17
• The fastest time to tie a pair of shoelaces in the chest roll position - 10.46 seconds
• The most compact chest to floor backbends in 30 seconds - 11
• The most double arm hula hoop rotations with a human belt in 30 seconds (team of two) – 79 (shared with Mariam "Amazi" Olayiwola)