After seemingly endless flowbench and dyno work involving the tuning of ports, inlet tracts, exhaust systems, spark and cam timing, 90 hp was seen at the rear wheel as measured on a Dynojet in full inertia mode (approx 100hp at the crank): A 50% increase in power over the cafe racer motor that I had campaigned in 2015 and approximately 70% more than a stock R100. Not bad for an old shaft driven, 2 valve hemi pushrod engine. It was time to pack my tools and prepare for the 2 day journey into outback South Australia.

The bike’s land speed class is M-PG1000 (The DLRA have borrowed classifications and much of the rule book from Bonneville which is the Mecca of land speed racing). That is:

• Modified frame.
• Pushrod valve actuation.
• Pump gas – the stuff you get out of the bowser at your local petrol station i.e. No race fuel.
• 1000cc – the stock R100 is actually 980cc which is what I ran.

The record in this class was 144.6mph. (Annoyingly, since 2014,  it had been incorrectly recorded in the DLRA record books as 148mph). This is held by my arch nemesis (and friend) Josh Schuit on, yes, an airhead R100! Pushrod engines are older technology,  the class is mainly comprised of ‘classic’ bikes carrying marques such as BMW, Moto Guzzi and Harley Davidson.

16mph was needed over the 2015 128mph effort to match the record. Enemy No.1 is air resistance or ‘drag’. I had no idea whether the 50% additional power would be enough to push me and my machine through this conspiracy of air molecules. There is a squared relationship between velocity and drag, translated: At these speeds, you need a shite load more power to gain a fractional increase in speed. People who race naked bikes (unfaired, no streamlining) talk of hitting a wall at around 150mph  (242km/h) – every mph is hard won. I would hopefully be at least nudging this wall.