The World's Fastest Man Goes for It AgainJCBRecords are made to be broken, and few significant benchmarks go unchallenged for long. But Andy Green has been the holder of the world land speed record for nearly three decades, and remains the only person to have traveled at supersonic speeds in a wheeled vehicle on the surface of the planet. Back in October 1997, he drove the Thrust SSC to a two-way average of 763.03 miles per hour in Nevada's Black Rock desert. Since then, the only person who has got close to surpassing that achievement is Green himself, who was also the driver for the now-cancelled Bloodhound SSC/ LSR project that included a run at 628 mph.Now 63 years old, and retired from his parallel career as a combat jet pilot in the U.K.'s Royal Air Force, Green is preparing for another record attempt. This one is targeting less than half the speed achieved by Thrust SSC, but will be run on hydrogen power. After going supersonic, Green drove to a 350-mph diesel speed record in 2006 in the JCB Dieselmax, a car funded by the British manufacturer of construction machinery. Now, as it invests heavily in hydrogen combustion engines, JCB wants to set a hydrogen-powered speed record with the very similar-looking JCB Hydromax.JCB"The chairman invited me to go and see the hydrogen engines and I realised the technology was well ahead of anybody else," Green says, referring to Lord Anthony Bamford, son of JCB founder Joseph Bamford. "All of a sudden, I realized why a hydrogen-powered racing car like this made sense. And then I was asked if I wanted to support the record, and I asked in what role; 'Well, the chairman has you in mind to drive it.'"AdvertisementAdvertisementAfter what he says was a very short pause, Green agreed, and thus will be piloting Hydromax at the Bonneville Salt Flats later this year. The ambition is to go faster than the record set by Dieselmax and also to beat both the hydrogen internal combustion speed record (185.5 mph, set by BMW in 2004) and the fuel cell record (302.9 mph, set by Ohio State's Buckeye Bullet 2 in 2009.)Hydromax running at RAF Wittering, June 2026JCBBeyond the change of fuel and the technical advances of 20 years, the basics of the JCB Dieselmax and JCB Hydromax are pretty similar. Both cars share similar dimensions and the powertrain configuration of two engines, one driving the front wheels and one driving the rear ones. JCB's work on hydrogen combustion engines has been inspired by the limitations of using pure electric power in heavy machinery.JCB's existing four-cylinder turbocharged hydrogen engine has been heavily modified with input from engineering consultancy Ricardo. Power output for each engine has increased from the stock 74 hp to 800 hp, the rev ceiling has gone from 2200 rpm to 4500 rpm, and torque has risen from 325 lb-ft to 1300 lb-ft. Drive is delivered to each axle through a transmission from racing supplier X-Trac. Prodrive has built the chassis, and will be running the car though its record attempt. The presence of these top-end motorsport partners is an indication of just how seriously JCB is taking the record attempt.Land Rover Defender Octa "pusher car" gets the Hydromax rollingJCBI joined the Hydromax team during low-speed testing at an airbase in England prior to departure for the U.S. Green had already driven to 177 mph on one of the taxiways at RAF Wittering in Cambridgeshire, but on the day of my visit, he is having the novel experience of watching "his" car get piloted by somebody else—sportscar racing veteran Darren Turner, who will be acting as backup driver throughout the attempt.AdvertisementAdvertisement"Back when we did Dieselmax, I was flippantly saying to the guys, 'If I accidentally drown in the bath or fall down the stairs, what happens?' And the response was 'Don't worry, we'll find you a bungalow with a shower," Green says. "But it makes sense to have redundancy for me as well as everything else. We'll have spare bodywork in America, spare tires, every major component. So if something did happen to me, meaning we couldn't run this year, that would be crazy. That's why we've got Darren."Green and reserve driver Turner talking to R&TJCB"It's very different to anything I've driven before," confirms Turner, after his first-ever run in the car. "The procedural side is really important, everything taken slowly and checked and double-checked ... everything is planned in terms of the rev points, what speeds to change gear at, the target speed for a run; it's never 'just go out and do your thing.'"Despite having driven a huge variety of top-flight racing machinery, including a test-driver role for McLaren F1, Turner also said it was the first time he's had to deploy a parachute from a car. Although the plan is to have Green driving for what should be the fastest runs, Turner will get the chance for some high speed passes at Speed Week, before the dedicated record-setting sessions.Turner tries the seat for sizeJCB"One challenge is that we will have less space," says Green. "At Bonneville 20 years ago for Dieselmax, we were lucky enough to have 11 miles of brilliant quality salt, but we're not going to have that much this year—something in the region of nine or ten miles is what we're expecting. So this car will have to be quicker than its diesel-powered cousin just to get to 350 mph."AdvertisementAdvertisementGreen says he will be satisfied with any record-setting run. "Although 351 mph, rather than 350 mph, to have a margin over the diesel car," he says. "And that's not a given. This really is the cutting edge of hydrogen combustion—the only two Lambda:1 hydrogen engines in the world are fitted to this car, putting so much fuel in that they are burning all the oxygen the engines suck in… and you could actually put a glass up against the exhaust and drink the water that comes out."Green and the team will be at Bonneville Speed Week in early August, and will then attempt to set an FIA sanctioned record.JCBYou Might Also LikeIf You Can Only Own One Car, Make It One of TheseThese Are the Most Popular Cars by State