The fastest manned vehicle/So near and yet so far

The fastest manned vehicle record has been standing for quite some time as it's held by APOLLO 10 which was crewed by Thomas Stafford, John Young and Eugene Cernan. On their return journey from the moon they clocked an impressive 39,897km/hr (11.08km/s or 24,791mph) on the 26th May 1969.

Apollo 10 was a dry run for the eventual first landing of APOLLO 11 and Young and Cernan in the lunar module "Snoopy" came within 15.6km of the Sea of Tranquility (the module was deliberately not set up to land so that the crew, however tempted, wouldn't attempt an unauthorized landing).

PS.Young and Cernan would join the elite 12 on later Apollo missions though, so they did eventually set foot on Luna.