You can’t have your cake and eat it. But you can surely drive it before you eat it.
Former IndyCar champ and semi-retired pro race driver Michael Andretti marked another first for his career by eating his car at the end of a race. It helped that the car was made of cake, a prerequisite for setting a double record for the Guinness Book of World Records.
Guinness records are the stuff of wonder in that they’re often the most unexpected, unnecessary, bravest, or dumbest stunts in the world. With all that, they’re always, without exception, extraordinary. And we can all use a dose of extraordinary and sheer awesomeness in our lives.
This record was actually set on November 18, 2020, and Mike Elder, Chef and Cake Artist for Black Sheep Custom Cakes, is the official record holder. Andretti was the “driver,” though the term only loosely applies since the only driving he did was sit in the driver’s seat and hope the aluminum chassis-propped confection stopped where it was supposed to stop.
Put together as part of a PR stunt by ilani Casino Resort, the record involved making two racing cars out of cake. As per the rules, they had to be 90% edible, so Elder used an aluminum chassis, a trolley more like it, and built from there. A team of nine people worked for 46 hours on end to build the pair of racing cars, with the white one having 139 vanilla sheet cakes with buttercream frosting and the black 145 chocolate sheet cakes with the same frosting.
Both vehicles were covered in Satin Ice fondant with edible images and fondant details and were carefully transported by trailer to the starting point. Then, they were rolled off the ramp of a parking lot, with Andretti going first. The white cake car was made to resemble his own, while the black one was made in honor of his father’s race car.
Andretti rolled into history books: the confection set the record for the world’s fastest edible vehicle (27.49 kph/17.08 mph) and the world’s longest distance covered by an edible vehicle (106.62 m /349.81 feet). Luckily, neither vehicle crashed, so they were still edible at the end.
Before you cry, “what a waste of cake!,”Fox Auto says that the 500 pounds (227 kg) of cake was handed over to a local organization feeding the homeless.
Elena has been writing for a living since 2006 and, as a journalist, she has put her double major in English and Spanish to good use. She covers automotive and mobility topics like cars and bicycles, and she always knows the shows worth watching on Netflix and friends. Full profile
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