THE DARK KNIGHT: THE BAT-POD

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. -- Christian Bale has an embarrassing admission: Batman couldn't drive his own motorcycle.

The Dark Knight features a new vehicle, the Bat-Pod, which is to motorcycles what the Batmobile/Tumbler is to cars.

"That was an embarrassing challenge, I have to admit," Bale said during the recent press junket for The Dark Knight. "There's not a single moment in the movie when I'm absolutely in control of that thing."

Bale said the design of the monstrous Bat-Pod -- directly derived from the Batmobile -- was prohibitive of an easy ride.

"They're essentially the wheels from the Tumbler," he said. "I ride motorbikes, but there were world-class bikers who were getting on this thing and coming straight off it.

"So I had to recognize at that point, 'Look, I ain't going to manage it, either.' So whenever you see me on it, there's still an adrenaline rush, but I'm getting dragged behind another vehicle at 60 miles per hour."

The only person who was able to master the Bat-Pod was professional stunt rider Jean-Pierre Goy. He had to lean his upper body forward, almost horizontally, and steer from his elbows, rather than his wrists.

"I've worked with Jean-Pierre a couple of times, and he is one of the best bike riders in the world, if not the best," said Chris Corbould, The Dark Knight's special effects supervisor. "Right away, he totally got in the mindset of learning that machine.

"He said, 'I'm not riding another bike until I finish this sequence,' because he had to concentrate on the Bat-Pod's unique handling qualities. I'd be lying if I said it was easy for even him to ride, but it looked spectacular when he did, so it was worth the effort."

The original design for the Bat-Pod came from director Christopher Nolan and production designer Nathan Crowley, who came up with a rough model and then brought in Corbould.

"I was flabbergasted," Corbould said of his initial reaction. "I stood there silently, pretending I was mulling it over, but the thought going through my head was that they both had to be off their nut. Where was I going to put a power train? And with those massive wheels, would this thing actually steer? There were so many issues."

But Corbould and his crew went to work in London and the final product was surprisingly close to what Nolan and Crowley cooked up.

"The funny thing is I don't think Chris or Nathan had ever ridden a motorcycle in their lives, so they were completely unaware of the mechanics needed to get that thing moving," Corbould said. "In a way it was beneficial because they weren't steered towards a more orthodox bike, even subconsciously. The fact that they had no knowledge of the mechanics helped them create this weird, wonderful vehicle."

"The finished product that Chris and his team came up with was very striking, very effective and worked very well, but it's incredibly difficult to ride and to steer," Nolan said.

Just ask Christian Bale.