Records

The latest front-wheel drive warrior to set a Nurburgring record is the Honda Civic Type-R, but the past few years have been such a record-breaking rollercoaster, we thought it was worth taking a look at the hyper-hatches that have lapped before it.

The Nordschleife has become the ultimate test bed for anyone who wants to prove their sports car is the real deal. Now, Mercedes has set a new rear-drive record for production cars with the AMG GT R.

​Although portable record players have been around for decades, they're generally still not small enough to just be thrown in a bag – after all, they do have to accommodate a spinning LP. The RokBlok, however, doesn't "house" the record at all. Instead, it drives around its surface in circles.

​Every month since May 2015 has broken the record for average global temperature recorded that month. Finally, after a 16-month hot streak, October 2016 saw slightly cooler temperatures than this time last year, thanks to La Niña. But 2016 is still on track to be the warmest year on record.

The Nordschleife has grabbed plenty of attention lately, with a glut of records ​for front-drive cars, but none of the record attempts can match Han Yue's latest lap. Yue used a modified Mini to lap the Nordschleife on two wheels, completing the lap in just over 45 minutes.

Honda Aircraft Company has given credence to its claim that its HondaJet is the fastest jet in its class by breaking two speed records. The records were set over two recognized courses in the US from Teterboro, New Jersey to Fort Lauderdale, Florida and Boston, Massachusetts to Palm Beach, Florida.

Volvo Trucks is claiming two new world land speed records. It's custom-built "Iron Knight" truck reportedly achieved an average speed of 131.29 km/h (81.58 mph) and a time of 13.71 seconds over 500 m (1,640 ft) and 169 km/h (105 mph) with a time of 21.29 seconds over 1,000 m (3,281 ft).

No-one likes getting stuck behind a slow-moving truck on the roads, but the likelihood of being held up by Volvo's "Iron Knight" truck is minimal. Based on a Volvo FH, it has been specially built to set new speed records, kicking out 2,400 hp and 6000 Nm of torque.

On the track, no car epitomises Jaguar's past success better than the D-Type which won Le Mans in 1956. We'll know just how much one of Jaguar's most significant racers is worth when it goes under the hammer on August 19 but rest assured, records are likely to be broken.

Having already been thwarted twice in its attempt to take the motorcycle world land speed title back to the UK, Triumph will return to the Bonneville Salt Flats​ later this month​ for another crack at besting the 376.363-mph (605.698-km/h)​ record set in 2010.

There's a good reason people don't throw themselves out of airplanes without parachutes or wingsuits, and that's because it rarely ends well. Skydiver Luke Aikins will be hoping that tomorrow is one of the rare occasions where that's not the case, as he jumps 'chute- and 'suit-less from 25,000 ft.

Even though Tesla's Model S accelerates like a McLaren F1, it's not the fastest street legal EV​ in the world. That honor is reserved for the Genovation GXE, a reimagined Corvette Z06 that has now set a new land speed world record of 205.6 mph (331 km/h).