LOOK: NFL legend Adam Vinatieri just set a Guinness World Record on top of a mountain in the Swiss Alps

Yup, a Pro Football Hall of Famer now holds a Guinness World Record

Sep 24, 2026 at 3:32 pm ET • 2 min read

Over the course of his 24-year career, Adam Vinatieri set plenty of NFL records, and now he might have actually topped himself in retirement by setting a WORLD record. 

The former NFL kicker recently traveled all the way to the Swiss Alps where he set the record for the highest field goal in the world. You probably didn't know that was a record that could be broken, but it is, and now Vinatieri has it. 

The former Patriots and Colts star traveled to Jungfraujoch, which is known as the Top of Europe. A railway there takes you up the mountain to an altitude of 11,332 feet (3,454 meters), and that's where Vinatieri hit his record-breaking kick. 

It's not an official world record until the people at Guinness are involved, and the company confirmed that Vinatieri did, in fact, set the record for the highest field goal ever kicked. 

The Hall of Fame kicker still holds multiple NFL records: He's scored the most points in NFL history (2,673), he's made the most field goals (599) and he even won four Super Bowls. If there's one thing Vinatieri thrived at in his career, it was kicking in the snow. 

He essentially kickstarted the Patriots' dynasty in 2001 by hitting an improbable 45-yard field goal in the snow during a 16-13 divisional playoff win, where he also hit the game-winning kick in overtime. 

If you can make a kick with that kind of pressure hanging over your head, then kicking on top of a mountain probably isn't that difficult. 

"Snow is simply part of my time with the Patriots," Vinatieri said in a statement. "But kicking a field goal at 3,454 meters is something completely different from anything I've ever seen in the NFL. You feel the altitude with every breath you take, your heart rate is different, your rhythm is different, and no one can really tell you beforehand how it will affect the kick, because no one has done this before. The fact that we were able to set the record under these conditions makes me very proud. This is definitely one of the most special field goals I've ever made."

Based on how easy Vinatieri made the field goal look, I'd say the hardest part of the kick might have been getting the field goal posts up on the mountain. 

Vinatieri retired from the NFL following the 2019 season. He spent the first 10 seasons of his career in New England, where he won three Super Bowls. In 2006, he signed with the Colts and won another Super Bowl during his 14 seasons in Indianapolis.