YouTuber Ryan Trahan has completed his bizarre challenge of crossing the United States in 30 days, starting with just one penny, to deliver a penny to Jimmy ‘MrBeast’ Donaldson before the US Mint stops producing them.
Ryan Trahan has climbed the ranks to become one of the most innovative creators on YouTube. From undertaking peculiar challenges like spending days on end VR Minecraft to staying in the world’s loudest room for as long as possible, the YouTuber has amassed close to 10M subscribers.
However, at the end of May, the 23-year-old set out on a new quest. After successfully surviving on just $0.01 for an entire week, the YouTube star has followed up with a new challenge that many would deem to be impossible.
Before the US Mint stops production of its penny in 2023, Ryan set out on a road trip to cross the U.S in 30 days to deliver one to MrBeast all while raising money for Feeding America along the way. After a long and grueling month of making money in any way he can and documenting the entire thing daily, he finally completed the challenge.
The challenge began in Venice Beach, Los Angeles, with the goal of reaching MrBeast in a small town in North Carolina on the opposite side of the country. However, there are three main rules Ryan must stick by: All profit must come from the penny. All food, boarding, and transportation must come from profit from the penny. And finally, he must reach MrBeast in 30 days.
Immediately kicking off the challenge, Ryan scrambled to turn some profit. After a few trades, he worked his way up to a dollar, where he bought a bottle of water to sell for two bucks.
The next 30 days would be surprisingly entertaining. On his journey, Ryan went from telling jokes to drunk people on the famous Las Vegas strip, to mowing lawns, delivering food and walking dogs in Texas.
However, the road trip certainly wouldn’t be easy. As the main goal was to raise as much money as possible for Feeding America, Ryan gave donators incentives. With every donation of $50k, it would activate the ‘The Great Reset’ – which would force Ryan to give up all his cash and reset back to a penny.
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Ryan Trahan completes MrBeast penny challenge
Ryan was reset on multiple occasions throughout the 30 days, sometimes losing hundreds of dollars at a time. On his final few days of the challenge, Ryan was in Nashville, Tennesse – over 600 miles away from MrBeast.
However, after selling ice-cold soda in the extreme heat, Ryan collected enough to purchase the final plane ticket to North Carolina. In an emotional last video on Day 30, and in a complete miracle, Trahan completed the challenge and gave Jimmy his long-awaited gift.
Of course, in classic MrBeast fashion, he had a trick up his sleeve. At the finish line, Jimmy laid out four briefcases, each containing money ranging from $0 to $100k – which Ryan was forced to pick one. Fortunately, the YouTuber picked out a case that had $50k sitting in it.
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While it’s certainly impressive that Ryan managed to cross an entire country with just a cent, it’s even more noteworthy that he raised over a million dollars doing so. With the original goal of raising $100k, Trahan and his YouTube community raised 13.8M meals and counting for Feeding America.
Along the way, he gained over 2.3M subscribers and garnered over 250M views on YouTube during the month of June alone. Overall, the series was nothing short of spectacular, and certainly worth watching. Kudos to Ryan for completing the challenge.