It's a question we've all asked ourselves before: How many professional cyclists would it take to recharge a battery-electric vehicle?

Or, maybe you haven't asked yourself that before, and we're just weird. At any rate, a Finnish TV show by the name of "Ennätystehdas," or "The Record Factory," might have the answer. The show recently featured the work of inventor Janne Käpylehto, who's built a system that harnesses the kinetic power from a fleet of bicycles and converts it into electrical power, like for an EV charger. For his demonstration, Käpylehto enlisted the help of nine professional track and road cyclists, all pedaling in unison for a total of 20 minutes in an attempt to add range to a Tesla Model X's power-hungry battery pack.

Altogether, in that time, the pro cyclists managed to add approximately 2 km - roughly 1 and a quarter miles - to the Model X's estimated range. So the answer to our original question - how many cyclists does it take to recharge an EV - really depends on how much time you've got. At that rate, it would take roughly 3 days, 22 hours, and 10 minutes to fully recharge a Model X Long Range Plus, and that's assuming no one takes a break to eat or use the restroom.

In other words, you probably shouldn't ditch your home charger and plan to replace it with a NordicTrack; despite everything 1999's "The Matrix" taught us, the human body just isn't a very good, efficient mechanism for generating power. Windmills and coal plants don't have to exhaust precious effort performing such ancillary tasks as breathing, maintaining body temperature, and thinking. Thank God for that.

Still, Käpylehto's invention is a neat one, and while it might be foolhardy to ever rely on pedal power to recharge a big electric SUV, we could see those cyclists recharging, say, an e-scooter in no time at all.