Above, you'll seen an old man drifting a tractor in the forest, and pretty much everything you need to know about Finland. Below is the story of how this same old man – four-time world rally champion Juha Kankkunen – set a new Guinness World Record for the fastest speed ever recorded for tractors.
In order to drive as fast as possible on snow in a straight line, you don’t necessarily need a guy who managed to become a rally world champion with three different manufacturers four times between 1986 and 1993. Especially with such amazing drivers on the payroll as Petri Paananen or ice speed champion Janne Laitinen.
Still, Nokian really wanted to show off its first winter tire for tractors, so the Finnish Valtra T234 tractor had to get the most experienced guy behind the wheel despite being very different to a Peugeot-Talbot T16, a Lancia Delta HF, or even a Toyota Celica Turbo.
A retuned ECU, a few runs and a broken gearbox later, the rally legend set a new world record of 130.165 km/h (83.98 mph).
Well, all I can say is that 84 mph is the highway speed limit in most of Europe, and the top speed of my Autobianchi A112. So that will do.
Contact the author at mate@jalopnik.com.