I had the pleasure of attending three days of the Bonneville Speed Week. It is in Utah, a very friendly ATV state. Many folks used ATVs to get around or run errands on the expansive area of the salt. Sure, there were bicycles, dirt bikes and lots of hot rods. But our ATVs are useful transportation tool also. You can carry things and pull a trailer. The course is about 7 miles long, the pits are about 3 miles from the start line, and the pits are about 3 miles long. It is a big, big area.

This is my first time at Bonneville. It is a "grass roots" motorsport for sure. I didn't see any big transporters or luxury motorhomes here; just guys working on their cars under canopies. These "hot rods" are built to a rule book and then run for a "world record". I saw lots of small block Chevy motors. It was the 70th year of the event. I think the event was started when Pontiac (the Bonneville) and others were doing endurance speed testing. And the California hot rodders were running "races" on dry lake beds and / or the beaches of Daytona, Fl. I imagine it was "my hot rod is faster than yours" top speed competition that grew on the smooth, hard salt surface way out here in Wendover, UT.

I want an ATV / UTV class to answer the question "who has the fastest quad in the world". There are lots of motorcycle classes, so why not?

David



Bonneville pits



Trying for fastest Harley

 

That sounds awesome. I've been to the salt flats several times, and have driven on them with a number of different vehicles. I've even competed in USRA sanctioned desert races that cross the salt flats on their race course, in motorcycle classes, ATV classes, and UTV classes. On one of the desert races the sponsoring club had a radar gun hooked up to a LED sign, powered by a portable generator, and it would show your speed as you came by. On a geared up DS650 my speed was 96 mph., and I trophied on that race. I remember one race back in the day, on a Honda CR 500 that I had geared too high. I had put a six tooth smaller rear sprocket and a two tooth larger front sprocket on the bike for that race. Unfortunately, some of the salt flats were still a little wet, and even a CR 500 didn't have enough power to pull fifth gear. I was still top ending people in fourth gear. Toward the end of the first loop there was a particularly long salt flat that was dryer than the rest. I held it in fourth until the RPMs were so high you would have thought the engine was going to melt, then short shifted to fifth, and held it wide open. It took about a quarter mile to finally start coming on the pipe in fifth gear, and then really felt like it went into warp drive. OMG that was fast, and I was top ending people by what looked like a good 30 mph top speed. At the end of that straight away is where the pits were located. I had got a terrible start, but came in off the first loop in third place. That was the fastest I've ever gone on a dirt bike. Talk about great fun. Anyway, thanks for sharing. I need to get out there one of these years for speed week. It's good to see they are still doing that.

 

Sounds like a great time.

 

The condition of the salt surface it critical to record setting top speed runs as you mentioned. This year the salt was deemed near perfect. It was a little sticky on Saturday, but the heat and low humidity dried it out and it was "rock hard" by Monday. There were salt dust "rooster tails" behind the cars at mile three and beyond. There were only two spins during the three days I was there.

Here is a photo of a twin engined modified motorcycle built for top speed. And here is a photo of a "streamliner" also built for top speed. Danny Thompson set a world record for this class at 452 mph. That's mov'in!

David




danny thompson streamliner

 

Danny Thompson is Mickey Thompson's son, and his dad built the Challenger 2 50 years ago! "On Sunday morning, eight years of hard work culminated in a 450.909mph return run. Averaged with yesterday's speed of 446.605mph, we achieved a new two-way AA/FS record of 448.757mph, enough to make us the world's fastest piston powered record holder." THOMPSONLSR