Coming in behind Prevc, whose first jump was 237.5m, was Norway's Anders Fannemel (236, 238m), trailing behind Prevc by 14.4 points, and Japanese Noriaki Kasai (218,5, 225m).

Prevc managed to beat the record from four years ago, when Norway's Johan Remen Evensen jumped 246.5 metres, at the same hill in Vikersund, and joined Jože Šlibar, until now the only Slovenian record-holder in ski-jumping from 1961.

With 1,250 points in total, Prevc has taken over in the overall World Cup standings, outperforming Austria's Stefan Kraft by 42 points.

"It was truly fantastic. I'm still full of adrenaline. I had Fannemel's jump in front of my eyes, thinking I need to take this challenge," the winner said immediately after the race.

Congratulations were extended to Prevc also by his fellow ski-jumper Severin Freund: "This is crazy. There aren't many people in the world who believed it was possibly to fly 250 metres."

His coach Goran Janus meanwhile said: "I'm happy with this historic moment and one needs to take a moment to enjoy it. And I'd like to congratulate the whole team working with Peter.

Today's I was not particularly interested in a record, which may sound strange, but Peter said already yesterday that he could jump five metres longer, and today the conditions were perfect and the jump was really perfect and will make history. That's it!"

The 22-year old Prevc now boasts five wins, while Slovenia's record-holder in this respect in legendary Primož Peterka with 15.

Prevc has also two medals (silver and bronze) from the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi; his last World Cup victory is from Sapporo, Japan, on 24 January.

While today's win brings the total telly of Slovenian victories in individual ski-jumping events to 40, the country has also seven team World Cup wins.

Congratulations are already pouring in, especially on the twitter, including from PM Miro Cerar, who wrote "Congratulations to the new world record holder. Well done, Peter!"

Vikersund will host another event on Sunday, which will be a kind of rehearsal before the Nordic World Ski Championships, which begin in Falun, Sweden, Wednesday.