The Incredible World Record For Changing A Tire On A Moving Car

New drivers have a tremendous amount to learn. Finding your way around the wheel, the stick, the rules of the road and everything else in between can be overwhelming. In the U.K., between 2017 and 2018, the BBC reported, only 1 in 100 people passed their driving test without a single fault. It probably isn't surprising why.

Even veteran drivers on commutes they make every single day, can't plan for the unexpected incidents that can sometimes arise, like a flat.

Changing a wheel, like changing oil, can be a messy and painstaking job, but a vital one. It's the sort of thing that many of us can largely muddle our way through, but not with any particular degree of elegance and grace. Weather conditions, time of day and other things can make this seemingly simple task rather more difficult, but some masters of the art can defy all of these issues. That's why the world record for changing a moving car's tire is truly astonishing.

According to Guinness World Records, March 2010 marked a remarkable and peculiar feat. Terry Grant of the U.K. tasked himself with changing a wheel on a car, but the car in question was rotating at the time. Grant achieved his goal in a record time of three minutes and 10 seconds.

Like many such records, there aren't a lot of practical applications for this specific talent. It's impressive nonetheless, and just the sort of thing that viewers of Italy's "Lo Show dei Record" tune in to see. It's all about the spectacle.

On this very show, per Guinness World Records on YouTube, Italy's Manuel Zoldan and Gianluca Folco broke the record for doing the same thing on a moving car. With one minute and thirty seconds as the time to beat, Zoldan deftly rode a ramp to lift the car onto two wheels, keeping it in super slow motion in this awkward position as Folco got to work. He leapt triumphantly from the car at 01:17.64 seconds.

According to Motorsport in August 2021, Red Bull had the fastest average pit stop time (2.57 seconds) in Formula 1 before new rules were implemented to lengthen elements of the stops (ostensibly for safety's sake). These are feats in themselves for the engineers, but at least those vehicles were (oh-so-briefly) stationary.