Every year, plucky, courageous and wacky Germans do their bit to further the achievements of humankind by setting new world records. In 2022, a (record-breaking) 90 world records were set by Germans. Here’s a look at some of the year’s most impressive feats. 

Record-breaking 90 world records set in Germany in 2022

According to Olaf Kuchenbecker, the chief judge at the Record Institute for Germany - the German-language equivalent of the Guinness World Records - 90 new world records were set in 2022, as dpa reports. 

This is an all-time high - up from 80 in 2021, 75 in 2019, and 89 in the pandemic year of 2020. When coronavirus kept people confined to their homes, they presumably had a lot more time to practise. Colourful records set in 2020 without an audience included one man who ran a whole marathon holding a huge log on his shoulder. 

“This shows that the record-breaking spirit is unbroken - even amid the pandemic,” Kuchenbecker told dpa. The institute, which is based in Hamburg, gets the equivalent of one inquiry with a record-breaking idea each day. Not all are accepted as a new record category, but most who attempt a record actually succeed, according to Kuchenbecker. 

Trabis, Stollen, beer cans, drumsticks and leaning towers

So, in 2022, what impressive achievements were noted down for posterity in Germany? We’re glad you asked! For starters, we have 20 people in Saxony managing to squeeze inside a tiny Trabant car from former East Germany (we hope they didn’t attempt to drive), and some fearless soul speeding in a Bobby Car (a toy car for kids) down a street at 170 kilometres per hour! 

When it comes to food, Germans managed the impressive feat of baking a Christmas Stollen that reached the record-breaking length of 1.022 metres. Meanwhile, a Hamburg man managed to smash 113 full cans of beer with his elbow in 60 seconds. 

Elsewhere, a drummer from Kiel managed to twirl his drumsticks around his fingers 105 times in one minute, while a pair in Lower Saxony succeeded in changing a tractor tyre in just three minutes and 16 seconds. 

But our favourite has to be the award that went to the Schiefer Turm von Gau-Weinheim (the Leaning Tower of Gau-Weinheim) in Rhineland-Palatinate, which on September 11, 2022, was named the world’s most leaning tower; its 5.4-degree inclination puts the 4 degrees of the world’s most famous leaning tower, the Leaning Tower of Pisa, thoroughly to shame. Bravo! 

Thumb image credit: Rekord-Institut für Deutschland / Pressportal