Land Speed Racing History at the Bonneville Salt Flats [Malcolm Campbell's Bluebird, Land Speed Record setting car, circa 1927. Photo courtesy of the Florida Photographic Collection at http://ibistro.dos.state.fl] I think ever since engines were invented, men across the globe were seeing how fast they could get them to go. Eventually this became known as land speed racing. It was in 1898 that the first documented attempt for land speed racing was recorded. The man was the Conte de Chasseloup, the street was a long road outside of Paris, and the whooping speed that set the record was 39.24 mph! Since then we’ve been seeing how fast any sort of engine-powered, wheeled contraption would go…from empty roads, to Florida beaches, to Australian dry lakes, and of course… to salt flats in Utah. Why would so much effort be put into seeing how fast you can go? Quite apart from such factors as national prestige and technical advancement that are bound up inseparably with this Land Speed Record, there is satisfaction in knowing that you have driven faster than any other human being without any possible question of dispute. [p.13, The...

Bonneville Salt Flat Racing Studebakers I've already covered the two record-taking Studebakers for this 2010 Speed Week in previous articles of this Speed Seeking Studebakers series (#1 1953 Studebaker Coupe & #2 1949 Studebaker Pickup). So before looking at more racing Studes, I wanted to show you some of the fine Studebakers that spectators were driving around on the salt! To begin with, is Bob Weaver's 1953 Studebaker Coupe. I'm not sure color has as much to do with speed as the aerodynamics body of the Studebaker coupe - but in this case yellow=fast! My 5-year-old nephew exclaimed "Yellow cars are the fastest" while wandering around Gene Winfield's shop a couple of months ago, and in this case I'd say he's right! It isn't just the yellow color and aerodynamic body that's making this Studebaker go fast. This special Stude has a Chrysler Hemi powerplant! I was amazed at how snugly it fit in the engine compartment. This hot rod sure looks just as pretty under the hood as above it! Any Studebaker-fan knows that us Studebaker owners are a quirky bunch of folk! So I wasn't overly surprised...

Bonneville Salt Flats Race Truck I met Pete and his son (the driver) at Speed Week 2010, but we had been talking through email the last couple months.  I was cruising through the pits at the Bonneville Salt Flats on day 1 when I saw Pete and his Comanche heading to the Tech Inspection area to check in.  I followed behind them and then went over to say hi.  Before we get into the Jeep's performance at Speed Week, first, let's see what it took Pete to get there. In Pete's own words: "At this point I have more time than money. The Bonneville truck was to be a budget build but that didn't quite work out...  I consider myself to be a good mechanic and a reasonable engineer.  I have worked on my cars my whole life  and was a mechanic in the Army.  All of that said, I had never built a race car. I had re-built engines, but never built a race engine.   So what made me think I could build a record setting race truck?  Maybe it was more balls than brains.  And why a Jeep?   That question I know...

Bonneville Salt Flat Racing Vintage Studebakers #898 obviously isn't a coupe, but it's still Speedy. And most importantly, it's a Studebaker! This 1949 Studebaker farm truck out of Kansas took the second of the two records for this years Speed Week. And break a record did it ever! With Chevy power under the hood in it's AA/MP class, the old record was blown away by nearly 18 miles per hour! Norris Anderson definitely knows how to build one, as he powered this truck down the line at 219.331mph! And you know what that means, its a record-breaking run over 200mph... so Norris Anderson gets his well-deserved Bonneville 200mph Club admission. He'll be a happy man wearing that red hat. In fact... he was already wearing it, even as he did broom duty around the pits! It looks like Norris Anderson and his Broom Crew have a lot of fun out on the salt! It was in 2004 that Norris first found the old farm truck and began building it into a salt flats racer in 2004. Their motto? "Safe Trucks Travel Fast." Start here for All Speed Seeking...

Bonneville Salt Flat Racing Vintage Studebakers Heading up the line of this year’s Speed Seeking Studes, is #4594. It may not be the prettiest out there, but what it’s got going for it is a Studebaker engine and multiple record-holdings!  Greg Meyer's from Minnesota brought his Salt2Salt Racing's 1953 Studebaker Coupe powered by a 182cid V8 Studebaker engine, putting it in the F/CGALT class. I think it was the only non-Avanti to have Stude power rolling it down the line! The engine class being F, means it’s got to be somewhere between 123-183 c.i.d (cubic inch displacement.) In order to get this engine’s c.i.d. down to 182 the Studebaker V8 was destroked, pushing it into the “F” class by just a hair! Although Greg reports they encountered a few problems and there's still more to do to get this particular engine running at its top speed, they were still able to set 2 records in their class by the end of the week. First with Greg driving in the F/CGALT catagory at 131.593. Then with partner-in-crime, Bob Waitz driving in the F/CFALT catagory (wounded engine and all) at 113.998mph! Good job Salt2Salt...

Bonneville Salt Flats Race Car At the Bonneville Salt Flats, fast is fast, that's one thing that can't be disputed and it's what separates land speed racing from other automotive events... the lack of subjectivity! It's funny that there aren't really any awards at Bonneville Speed Week save for the "Hot Rod" trophy for the fastest race car of the week from any class. And did you know that there's no money? You have to buy your jacket if you get into the 200mph club!  These guys do it for the pure pursuit of speed and that's why this 200mph Flathead powered streamliner is one of the Baddest Race cars of the 2010 Bonneville Speed Week! I already told you about this streamliner in another story called: Arizona Model T Streamliner Destroys a Record! But that was 2009! Tom Brawner of Scottsdale, a MyRideisMe.com member, crew member (and driver now, right Tom??) and fellow hot rodder with a too cool 1956 Chevy told me about this streamliner called the "Matrix Machine". The record set last year started at under 100mph in 2004, then went to 160 last year and...

Bonneville Salt Flats Race Car What's the baddest race car at Bonneville Speed Week 2010? If you asked 100 people, you might get 90 different answers. (Where does he come up with that crap?) Who cares what you think, it's my website, so I'm posting what I think are the baddest rides on the salt. From there, lets discuss... this is an interactive magazine, not some glued together pile of pages sittin' in your bathroom! Interact and leave a comment below.   First up: The Fiat Simca of George Fields of Newark, TX Bonneville Speed Week Race Class: E/BFCC   That long enough for you? I found out from Tom Burkland (more about him later) tuner and friend to George that the competition coupe rules allow for some slight modifications to the stock body... the SCTA rulebook states: "Production coupe or sedan body unaltered in width or contour." But what they don't say is, from the cowl back.  From the cowl forward, anything goes! The car can be as long as you like as long as the engine only has a 50% setback. Contrast this modern day racer to...

Bonneville Salt Flats Racer at Speed Week 2010 Bonneville Salt Flats is full of cool car guy stories.  Here's another one for you.  This one is from Ford Y Block lover, Tim McMaster (Y Block Guy) who built a land speed racing motor for this Yellow Fridge Cab pickup owned by Charlie Burns.   This Y powered pickup runs in the E/PP class, which is E motor (184-260 cu in), Production Pickup, where the record is 126.073 MPH.  On Saturday when I took these pictures, Tim ran 113 MPH while making his "Rookie Run" since he's a new driver at Speed Week. Tim McMaster tells us about his Y Block love story: "Y-Blocks, you could say, have always been a part of my life from the time I can remember riding between my dad and uncle in the 292 powered F-600 hauling a load of oranges to the Blue Goose packing house in Strathmore, CA, I know that goes a ways back and I didn't even know what an engine was back then but that truck is still working on the ranch today and I have some other stories that involve that...

Bonneville Salt Flats Race Car Sometimes it's easy to pick a feature car. The reasons why I dig the 1964 Ford Fairlane were spelled out in the feature I did about the Ring Brothers 64 Fairlane. Beyond the family tie and the legend of the Thunderbolt, this Fairlane just looks BAD! I searched for this car at Speed Week last year, but never did find it. I wanted to get a t-shirt for pops too... For Speed Week 2010, I caught up with Brian and Celia Dean and their AA/CGC Fairlane known as "Thundersalt". The CGC stands for Classic Unblown Gas Coupe. (I guess the U is silent?) The AA in the class title for this thump'n Fairlane stands for greater than 500 cubic inches.  Thundersalt runs a 557 inch big block Ford.  (thank goodness it ain't a Chevy! It would have broken my pop's heart!) Based on a bored and stroked 429 Cobra Jet block, the CJ is then topped with Trick Flow A460 heads.  Brian estimates about 925 horsepower on racing gas flowing through the Holley 1650 Dominator carb. Brian explained, "We build shit to go fast!"...

Upcoming Pictures and Stories from Speed Week 2010 "Thundersalt" is a 215mph 1964 Ford Fairlane More about this bad Fairlane Don't wait any longer, Speed Week's here! Since last year, the MyRideisMe.com crew's caught major "Salt Fever". Starting last year, we took in, or at least tried to, the race cars, the scenery and the fantastic people of Bonneville Speed Week. Now we're hooked. From 400 mph streamliners like the Speed Demon to VW's and some kind of French owned and raced, Suzuki powered English car, there's something here for everyone. It'd be easy for me to whine about my drive to Bonneville, but these guys and my new Australian mates shipped their rides in from outa the country! Whatever this is (I'll try investigate, don't worry!) I dig it. I call this shot, "All Motor" Speed Week officially kicks off on Saturday so Friday's tech day. Don't mistakenly think the teams are relaxing with a cold one (that happens later). For the two streamliner teams I interviewed, it's serious business, checking everything and making focused plans to do one thing: Set a record (or break something trying). Anything...

Bonneville Salt Flats: Gearing up for Everything Speed! There's always one new car or project out there that makes you go think: DAMN! I found one. Richard Noble, you might have heard of him, is leading the charge. In his words: "Welcome to the BLOODHOUND Project, the engineering adventure for the 21st century. We are pushing the limits and inspiring our young engineers and scientists with our incredible car capable of 1,000mph" 1000 mph. Richard's got the experience to do it too. He held the land speed record from 1983 to 1997 driving Thrust2 on the Black Rock Desert in Nevada. His record was a mere 633mph. Now, the team led by Noble's looking to blow past the record of ThrustSSC at 763mph and break 1000mph. If they can do it, they'll be the second car ever to break the sound barrier. There's nothing more I can say about the car that's not spelled out in full (overwhelmingly so) detail on the Bloodhound SSC homepage. So let me share a couple videos: Animated Video of the Bloodhound SSC's record breaking run: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CQOWYkJSzI[/youtube] Richard Nobel's old ride, Thrust2 1983 Record...

Salt Flats Racing: Everything we got! Bonneville Speed Week 2012: (Updated as new stories are added) Hot Rods at the car show happening with Bonneville Speed Week All Smiles for Record Setters at Bonneville Speed Week Record Setting Bombshell 1952 Buick Super Riviera 2012 Speed Week Warm-up – Old Friends and New Friends on the Salt 841 Cubic Inches and 1,850 Horsepower to Bonneville for Fun, Records and Charity Bonneville Speed Week 2011: Bonneville Speed Week 2011 – Record Breaking Plan Coffee and Salt – Bonneville Morning at Speed Week 2011 Heating up at Speedweek 2011 – Bonneville Salt Flats Day 1- Bonneville Speed Week 2011 – Spectre Performance Blowfish Swimming Upstream – Speed Week 2011 Hot Rods of Bonneville Speed Week 2011 Day 2 – Bonneville Speed Week 2011 – Spectre Performance Day 2 – Speedweek 2011 at Bonneville Salt Flats More Speedweek 2011 at Bonneville Salt Flats Record Breaking Runs – Speedweek 2011 Chasing 400 mph – One Mile at a Time Bonneville Speed Week 2010: Bonneville Speed Week 2010 – Baddest Race Cars Bonneville Speed Week 2010 – First Look More Salt Please - More pictures...