High school student puts his skills to the test by juggling fire for record time

A teenage juggling sensation set the record-breaking world on fire with an impressive show of his skills.

15-year-old Arnav Rathi (USA) has claimed the record for longest duration juggling three flaming torches with a mammoth time of 7 min 20.77 sec, beating the previous time of 5 min 33.82 sec achieved by Ian Stewart (Canada) earlier this year.

Arnav is a high school sophomore, a part-time circus coach and the founder/leader of a juggling summer camp. And while it should really go without saying, it’s worth pointing out that juggling fire is dangerous and you shouldn’t try it unless you’re as well-trained as Arnav is.

The student, who lives in Mason, Ohio, with his parents and younger brother, was keen to break a record and researched titles he felt he stood a good chance at beating.

“I've always thought having a world record would be cool and a good resume builder as a performer,” he said.

“I trained originally without fire, I practised juggling unlit torches for two minutes past the record time so that I would build endurance. Eventually I did multiple trials with fire to get a better feel for it and that's how I got ready.

“While this was happening I was also training 10+ hrs a week in other juggling areas for my own shows and competitions, so that also greatly increased my juggling ability and endurance.”

Despite the fact he’s working with fire, Arnav says it’s not really as dangerous as it looks, but that of course there are safety risks.

He said: “Seeing as I needed the torches to last as long as possible, I had to soak them in fuel for a long time causing the peak flames during the attempt much bigger than usual, and it can get very close to my face and clothes.

“There is also a risk of burning fuel to fly off the torch and hit me, this is why I failed my first attempt, about half way through I got a bit of burning fuel under my eye and I dropped one. There was no lasting effect but it shocked me enough to drop.”

Read about more people breaking records like this in our Hobbies and Skills section.

Arnav was affected by his failed attempt but brushed it off and came back fighting to claim his record.

He doesn’t currently have any more record attempts planned, but he has plenty of ideas for things he could try next, including running and juggling at the same time – aka joggling – a skill he’s used to win gold medals at the International Juggling Association (IJA) championship.

Keep up to date with everything Arnav is doing on his website, Juggle for Wellness. He’s passionate about using juggling as a tool to build focus, confidence, perseverance and joy.