Salt, Speed and Dust – Chapter 12

Run Ten

“The good life is not, I am convinced, a life for the faint-hearted. It involves the stretching and growing; the courage to be.  It means launching yourself fully into the stream of life.”  -Carl R. Rogers

We had to make this happen right now.  The sun was getting higher and we had been trying for four days.  We had to leave today.

At 197 mph I had some wheelspin and wobble, but I recovered by putting more weight on the pegs and it went away.  Sixth gear had the rpm down at 10,000.  My top speed was at mile 4 – 198.19.

We decided to put a 39 tooth sprocket on instead of a 40 tooth, and leave it in fifth gear.  This would effectively give us another half a gear.  It was a dance between speed and power.  We just needed ½ mph more!

Run 11

Crosswind blowing at 7 mph.  Soft salt.  I stayed right.  I saw 201 on the speedo, then it dropped to 200, and 199, and 198 with wheel spin.  Did I make it?

When I went to get my timing slip they said their computer had gone down and to come back later – they didn’t know when.  Are you kidding?

Finally we got the timing slip – at mile 4 the top speed was 198.99. 

Ughhh.

We decided to stay one more night and try again in the morning.  We couldn’t give up so close.  Chris wanted to call it a day so we didn’t blow the bike up or break anything, but I wanted to try again – so I did.

196.74 is all I could get.  The wind picked way up.  We waited at the course for several hours more, but the wind only increased. 

We went back to the hotel, and kept thinking…

Chapter 11 – "Fortune favors the bold"

Run Eight

“audentes Fortuna iuvat” – “Fortune favors the bold”  

Day three, Monday, last run.  The wind was 5 mph, and toward the end of the course the flags were pointing directly at the start.  A 5-mph headwind is 5-mph slower speed.

I stayed far left on the course to stay out of the salt that was chewed up by the powerful cars.  I didn’t feel much wheelspin until mile 4 ½.  It was a good run, but we didn’t learn much.  I topped out at 188.63 at mile 4.

The crew was building faith in my riding ability.  I was taking the bike to the max each run and I was very consistent.  I was doing my part.  We weren’t short because of me and they knew that now. 

When I was home weeks earlier, I had some anxiety about whether I could ride this bike so fast – what it would feel like and how scary it would be.  While I did my best to not think about fear or failure, some remained through the first six runs or so. But I had stayed present, learned from each experience, and it wasn’t so scary anymore.  Fear is something we manufacture – most often unnecessarily.  That is to say, it doesn’t help.  It just causes suffering in advance, and hurts our ability to perform.  Controlling what is going on in our own head is our first challenge.

There was no line to run again, but we decided to go work on the bike for tomorrow instead.  We were topped out at 188, four runs in a row.

I thought we could possibly break 200 mph early the next morning and here’s why –

1)    The salt is hard and faster in the morning.  The cool night air stiffens it up and there is better traction and no wheel spin.

2)    Hopefully in the morning there would be no headwind.  If we get lucky there will be a tailwind but we hadn’t seen that since we got here.

3)    We bought C12 race gas, at $30 a gallon.  The extra octane should help.

4)    We put the good tire from the white bike on the red bike, and lowered the air pressure to 20 psi.

5)    We put a new chain on to get the rear wheel closer in.

The salt and wind were the number one and two factors I thought.  I just have to do what I have already done as a rider and I’d have it, I thought.

Tuesday morning came – Run #9.  This was it.  We had to leave here today to go to the Vegas to Reno off-road race, and the first run in the morning would be our best chance.  I was excitedly optimistic.

The track opened for the record breakers late, about 7:45, and they took a long time.  In my mind I was saying “come on, come on, hurry!”  I didn’t want the sun to hit that salt and soften it up.  Clouds helped block some of the rising sun. Temperature 74 degrees. A slight tailwind faded to a 6-mph quartering crosswind.  Dang! 

I got off the line at 9:10 am and shifted through the gears up to fifth, where I remained.  The salt dissolved from a fast-moving conveyor belt to a blur under me.  I watched the tach and tucked as tight as I could.  I was very far right on the course.  So far that at the three-mile mark I looked up and saw the  “3” sign go by me, just five feet away, at nearly 200 mph.  No time for adrenaline to be released.  The danger of blowing through the 4’ square sign was here and over in a flash. I leaned a touch toward the center of the course and watched the digital, GPS driven speedometer.

I saw 198, 199, then 200!  But it was very brief and dropped back down to 199, then 198.  I tucked as tight as I could to try to get it back.  My butt was all the way back to the speed hump and my helmet was in hard contact with the gas tank.  It went up to 200 again, then dropped to 199.  Then to 200 again, then dropped again.  I had to average 200 mph over a measured mile. 

I got my timing slip on the way back to the start line with great anticipation.  Maybe I had done it.  The slip showed 199.45 at mile 4, and 199.31 at mile 5.  So close!  OMG!

We immediately got back in line and decided to shift to 6^th gear this time.  I was optimistic. We only needed ½ a mph!

I could taste it… 

Chapter 10 – Red It Is

Runs Six and Seven 

“Fear has always been a diminisher of life” – Marya Mannes

The Turbo bike was out.  If I was to get to my goal of over 200, I’d have to do it with 200 hp.  The world record is 211 mph, and who knows, he could have had a big tailwind that day.  The max speed of the bike stock is stated by the manufacturer to be 194.  I had it to 185 on my previous run; let’s see what fine adjustments we can make to get it to go faster.

We took the front brake lever off the bike for two reasons.  It was in the wind sticking out past the fairing, and a 200 mph wind has been known to depress a brake lever and apply the brakes!  I could stop without a front brake – with air brakes by slowly putting my elbows out into the wind and then my head as I slowed, and finally the rear brake.

So it is with other endeavors in life.  Small things are not so much of a problem when you are doing average things, but they can become critical if you are to achieve high performance and goals.  You wanna’ go high or fast, you have to master lots of things you didn’t think of before.

Dean ripped my knee pucks off my suit that are used to rub on the asphalt when road racing in turns.  I didn’t even know they were removable, but they were just velcroed on.  We leaned out the air/fuel mixture because we were at some elevation and it was hot.  Less air needs less fuel.

Dean told me to rev it to 10,500 rpm before shifting instead of 9000 rpm, and to stay in 5^th gear to get more rpm and more power.  I did all that.  Mile 2 ¼ – 181.95, Mile 3 – 184.23, Mile 4 – 185.2 and mile 5 – 186.24.

We got right back in line. It was a short line.  The team swapped windshields from the white bike while we waited our turn.  It was a little higher and they thought it would keep me out of the wind better.  I thought it did.

They told me to try to scoot my but back, which I did about 1 ½”, but my torso wasn’t long enough to get all the way back with the big gas tank in my chest.  This time, we were going to get to 10,500 rpm in 5^th gear and shift to 6^th and see what that will get us.  I did that and at mile 3 I topped out at 187.24, and it dropped to 184 in mile 4 and 182 in mile 5.  I hit soft salt at mile 4 and felt the rear wheel spin, slowing me down.

Sixth gear didn’t help because it dropped the rpm.  And fifth gear had the rpm but not the speed.  We needed a gear in between.  When we got back, Randall proclaimed sarcastically that the bike would not go 200, and he left on less than good terms.  We were glad he was gone.  You don’t need negative people on your team when you are trying to break new ground.

At this point, it was a physics puzzle.  As the rider, I didn’t know what I could do to go any faster. 

When confronted with a problem, share it.  Get more than just yourself thinking about it.  Crowdsource solutions.  Don’t give up.  Keep trying.

Chris and Dean, mechanics and racers both, tossed the problem in their heads…

Chapter 9 – Mechanical Resonance

Mechanical Resonance

Run Five – For Real

“If everything goes ‘as planned’, you aren’t doing anything interesting.” – Tom Peters

It was day 3, Monday. The sunrise over the salt with the mountains was just as breathtaking each day.  The hot rods parked beside tents and RV’s outside the salt along the access road were waking up.  The night before was a busy night for the crew.  Randall took the damaged header pipe from the turbo bike and drove two hours to Salt Lake City and stayed up until 3 am to custom fabricate a new one from a pipe he robbed off a Honda.  He returned to the salt with it very early and the team worked to get it mounted on the bike without the advantage of a full shop and equipment.

Chris and Dean had made a connection and got tires that were rated for over 200 mph.  They were slicks – no tread at all.  They would not “grow” with speed; that means with very high centrifugal force they wouldn’t get taller.  They went to tech inspection and got the 200-mph speed limit sticker off the bike.  We were cleared for our goal.

We were in line, nearly our turn with AJ in front of me, ready for another run at it.  When I started the bike Chris and Dean were attracted to the sound and listened to it.  I didn’t like the look on their faces.  They muttered to each other and listened closely to the engine.  Their faces said something was wrong.  They shook their heads over the noise.  They shut it down.  “We can’t run it. There’s a noise we don’t like.”

The 320 hp Turbo bike was out.  Here’s where the wisdom of bringing two bikes paid off.

Since my turbo bike wasn’t ridable, we bumped AJ, since he was sort of an exhibition rider getting free rides with the support of the entire team.  Honestly, I think he may have been somewhat relieved since the last run he wobbled so bad.  I got on the stock red bike, 120 hp less than what I was used to, minutes before I was to get the green light from the starter.  All of a sudden, I had a different set of challenges.  I had never been on this bike before.  It was different.  Bodywork in front, shifter position, and a few other things.  But the biggest difference was the stock gas tank.  It was a huge hump in my chest compared to the lower tank of the modified bike.  I was worried I couldn’t tuck my head down enough and rotate my neck up enough to see with a big tank in my chest.  No time to think about that – I got the green flag.

The red bike was powerful and smooth.  Less of a monster, but still very formidable.  I just met the bike minutes earlier and I took it to 185.64 mph at Mile 5, weight on the pegs and off the seat, and tucked in nicely.  I had a maximum speed of 188.  I hit some ruts at mile 3-4.

No swap.  Relieved.  Smiling…still 12 mph short.

Salt, Speed and Dust – Chapter 8

Run Five

Thwarted

“No passion so effectively robs the minds of all its powers of acting and reasoning as fear.” – Edmund Burke

It was 4:15 pm and the line was shorter towards the end of the day when many racers were starting their nighttime modifications to their machines to go faster the next day, or had blown their motors up.  Then there were the record breakers.  There are so many classes, that each day a dozen records or more are broken.  When you break a record, you have to go to “impound”.  You have four hours to tune your machine but are not allowed to make major modifications.  The next morning, all these vehicles go first out onto the salt and they have to beat the record a second time in order for it to count.

AJ has the red bike in line ahead of me.  It’s almost his turn and we notice the header pipe on my bike is missing!  It’s just a little stub coming out of the cowling in front of my foot, and it was gone!  O guessed that my bike swapped hard enough to knock it off.  I’m glad it didn’t take my own rear tire out!  But the pipe was out there, and if anyone hit it, like AJ, it could be disastrous like it was for Jason McVicar. 

We tell the starter immediately and they shut the track down.  Course workers drive the track looking for it.  It took ten minutes, but they found it, smashed as if it had been run over.  We were not sure if the 2 1/2” x 10” long steel pipe could have been flattened like that just from hitting and tumbling on the salt, but 193 mph was fast!

We pulled the turbo bike to our pit as AJ took a run.  He reported a wobble when he returned, but not as bad as his previous run.

It was the end of day two and we had officially reached 193.07 mph (and nearly crashed at that speed).  We packed up and headed off the salt.  There was much work for the team to do tonight…

Salt, Speed and Dust – Chapter 7 – Nearly Over

Run Four

“Happiness lies in a divine unrest; if you are lapped in comfort you stagnate and miss it.” – John Buchan

Randall gave me advice – put your butt all the way back.  There was a Speed hump in the rear fender and he wanted me to close the gap between me and it.  His advice was very short, and not framed with any questions or conversation otherwise.  “Ok,” I thought.  “I’ll put my butt back.”

I am a trainer and teacher.  One thing I learned and got very good at, is when you are trying to teach someone, you have to frame information and give it context, and be complete in your explanation.  Randall didn’t do that – at all.

We had the wrong tires to go over 200.  So we were going to take this run up closer to 200 and get the tires changed tonight.  I had qualified to ride the longer track and now had five miles per run to go fast and learn.

I let the clutch of the fire breathing turbo out and rolled off the line with a lot of confidence.  I dutifully shifted at 9000 rpm to the next gear.  The course was about 100 feet wide to the markers, with a blue stripe painted down the middle on the salt.  There were black markers up the sides of the course every quarter mile, and an orange sign with a big number on it for every mile.

The markers were going by with increasing velocity.  Everything felt good.  At mile 2 I was at 181 mph with 3 miles to go.  At 2 ¼ I was at 193.  Smooth sailing.  It always is until it’s not. 

Just before the Mile 3 sign at 194 mph, the bike started wobbling.  The rear of the bike swaps left while the front swaps right, then the opposite.  I held on tighter but that is not the problem or the fix.  It wobbled harder.  I knew not to chop the throttle or the back end would come around the front.  It didn’t stop.  4 seconds, five…I didn’t make any sudden moves, just eased the throttle down a touch.  It continued and adrenaline flooded my blood.  I didn’t know how to stop it.  Six seconds and eight.  Long enough to think about what I should do and what could happen. 

Mercifully, it stopped.  I rolled down.  Mile 3 completed at 191, and mile 4 at a frightful 170, mile 5 at a stunned 133.

All of a sudden my confidence for this entire goal was blown into the wind over the salt.  What happened?  I didn’t know.  I thought I hit ruts or sugary salt.  There are some very high horsepower vehicles that race here.  Around mile three to mile five they are really laying the horsepower down.  We’re talking up to 2500 hp, and when they unleash it at high rpm late in the course, they chew up the salt, forming ruts and loose salt.  Then here I come on two wheels, one of them under power.  I kept thinking it was the salt.

I was freaked out.  When I got back, AJ was freaked out too.  He said he got in a full-on “tank slapper” at 175 mph.  The same thing that happened to me.  We talked about what happened and what the cause could be.  I told him I was 6 feet right of centerline, but he went left of centerline.  What was it?

The world record on a Turbo Hayabusa was 247 mph.  On a stock one, it was 211 mph.  AJ told me the record holder, Jason McVicar, had crashed at 244 mph after he ran over a piece of metal left on the course when a previous vehicle blew its engine, and it gave him a flat tire which caused the crash.  I did not see the video on YouTube of the crash and didn’t want to at that time.  (I have now.  You can look it up yourself.)

Then there were the two crashes that Ron Cook had back in the late 1990s as he tried to break 200.  He started swapping each time.  I didn’t see that video either.

I didn’t want to go out again unless I had an explanation. I applied my logical mind.  Things don’t happen for no reason.  It’s physics.  What was the problem?  AJ and I talked more.  I asked him questions.  I saw other motorcycles in line, and I interviewed them.  I heard lots of unsure answers.  “It depends…”  That wasn’t good enough.  I asked more riders, and I looked for patterns in their answers.  One guy was on a highly modified Hayabusa and had been to Bonneville each year for many years.  He had never been over 200, and he didn’t have a good answer for me.

Then my mechanic Dean and I talked.  He was a retired road racer.  Road racers go 160-180 down the straights at some tracks.  He said keep your weight on the pegs to keep it low and forward.  Aha!  And he said sudden movements at high speed upsets the bike and the wind effect on the bike will change abruptly.

I told him I had my weight on the seat, and once I got up to sixth gear and 190, I did what Randall told me to do and put my butt back 6” to the speed hump – and I did it rather abruptly.  I went back to AJ.   “Do you move around on the bike at speed?” I asked.  “Yeah, a lot,” he said.  “Do you have your weight on the seat?”  “Yeah”. 

I had my answer.

I know when you load a trailer or a truck with all the weight to the back, it will sway at speed.  I looked at the bike.  Where my butt was on the seat was behind the pegs and obviously higher.  Dean told me to put my butt back, yes, but keep my butt off the seat like a jockey, so the weight is low and on the pegs.  It made sense, and now I was willing to go out and try again.

When we fail, we have to try again differently.  If we do things the same way, we will usually get the same result.  This goes for anything we are doing.  Practicing the wrong way doesn’t help, it just locks in bad habits that keep yielding less than desirable results.

Let’s try this again…

Chapter 6 – Next level

Run Three

“You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.” – Eleanor Roosevelt

We stopped at a trailer to get my timing slip.  It looks like a grocery store receipt, and it tells you’re your average speed at each of the timed intervals.  I then went to another trailer to get my B license, which allows me to go over 175.  My next goal was to go between 175 and 200.

We still had a big speed limit sticker on the side of our bike that said we were not permitted to go over 200 due to our tires.  I wasn’t worried about that now, but Chris was figuring out where to get new tires and how to get them mounted out there.

My team was a great help to me.  Well, no, sorry team.  That’s a huge understatement.  My team was indispensable to me even being here at all.  Some were mechanics, and some were helping me with my gear and holding an umbrella over me to shield me from the unrelenting sun and making sure I didn’t cook in my leather “onesie” suit.  I was sharing this experience with them and it made it a better experience and one we’ll never forget. They were in it as much as I was.  We were all pulling in the same direction.  One goal, one team.  One thing was for sure, I could not do this alone, or even with one or two other people.  Great endeavors always require a team. 

But then there was Randall, the experience Bonneville guy we had hired to coach me.  A bit of invaluable advice could make all the difference.  Randall was smart, experienced, and had an impressive resume.  But his social skills were off.  It was beginning to become more and more apparent.  He ruffled feathers at tech inspection, and his comments and advice were delivered in a less than helpful way.  Chris was starting to question whether he was helping the team or hurting it.  Meanwhile, his son AJ was getting a free ride on our back up bike.  AJ was a fine young man; smart, knowledgeable and drama-free.  I liked him a lot, and we compared notes after each run on the salt.

I rolled the throttle on for run #3, the second run of the second day.  I counted five shifts down to sixth gear, each at 9000 rpm, and then I just pinned it to the throttle stop.  320 hp is a thrill!  I saw 188 mph for a brief moment and averaged 183.32 mph at mile 3.  It was a great run.  I thought that now I would just need to tuck tighter, get my butt back, feet and knees in and head down and I’d make 200.

I got my timing slip, stopped and got my B license, and we got back in line for another run.  I thought I was going to continue a predictable progression to 200. 

I was wrong…

Salt, Speed and Dust – Chapter 5

Run Two

“Overcome fear, behold wonder” – Richard Bach

The morning sun was just peeking over the mountains as we drove back to the salt flats.  We got off the highway and onto the access road to the salt.  Bonneville Speed Week is a scene out of a volume of Americana.  There were hot rods everywhere.  Mostly “Rat Rods” – custom fabricated machines that started out as Model A and 1932 Fords and other cars from the pre-war era and wound up as lowered, flat black Chevy V8 powered open-wheeled examples of American cool.

“This is how we won the wars and sent a man to the moon,” Chris said sincerely.  All these guys who know how to build machines, toiling away in their garages learning and making these creations.  The comment included all the custom-built machines racing for speed.  Some low budget, and some 2500 hp one-million-dollar machines like the Speed Demon; a marvel of high tech engineering that looks like a rocket on the ground.

These same minds and the ones orbiting around them are the ones building high tech machines used to defend us, make our lives better, and to entertain us.  To see them express themselves at Speed Week in Bonneville is a sight to behold.  It’s worth a trip one year as a spectator to see what goes on there.  Alternatively, there are many movies and YouTube videos about Bonneville Speed Week where you can see the machines – the ones that race and the ones that don’t.

One thing we came to realize is the salt is hard and fastest in the morning before the sun comes up very high.  When the sun comes up and starts to beat on the salt, the salt becomes slippery.

The line to get on either course was long.  You could wait over two hours for a turn.  I had to stay on the short course, course 2, until I got my license to go over 175. 

Another rider rode the red bike.  A guy who was supposed to be my riding coach with a lot of experience on the salt had to cancel last minute.  He recommended another guy he knew named Randall.  Randall had a 23-year-old son, AJ, who wanted to take some runs at it.  Chris agreed, so we could learn faster and compare notes after each run.  We could also learn about the differences between the stock bike and the turbo bike.

AJ had made a successful first run the day before like I did and we both lined up again for our second run.  It was day two; a Sunday.  I was extra careful getting started to not break the wheel loose. I hit the shifter by accident, as it was too high, and I hit neutral.  I had to lift my heel off the footpeg to get on top of it to shift down.   I stepped down to second gear, then third.  The bike obediently accelerated as if it was no big deal.   The salt flew under me.  My goal was an average of between 150 and 175 on any mile stretch.  At mile two I averaged 167. 

I rolled it off, not picking my head up too early into a 160-mph wind, and gradually turned to the right toward the return road.  Of course, it wasn’t really a road, just a line marked on the vast flat plain of salt with flags and cones.  I was thrilled.  I thought that I could get to 200.

A big goal has to be broken into steps to get there.  When you accomplish a step, you are allowed to celebrate your progress.  Inside me, I did for a few minutes.  When we got back to the starting line though, it was back to business.

Chapter 4 – Casting out the Demon of Fear

Run One

“The first duty of life is still that of subduing fear.”  – Thomas Carlyle

The SCTA doesn’t allow you to get on the salt and just go as fast as you can on the first run.  That’s how people can get killed.  Going really fast on asphalt is risky enough.  Going fast on salt adds other dimensions of danger.

You have to “license up”.  For your first run, you get a class D license, which allows you to go over 125 but not over 150.  Once you do that, you get a class C license that allows you to exceed 150 but not 175.  When you demonstrate you can do that safely, you can then go over 175 but not 200.  Finally, a class A license permits you to exceed 200 – but not with these tires.

By taking it in stages like this, it allows you to learn about your bike and the salt.  If there is a problem, hopefully you will learn before it gets catastrophic.

I had to buy the right riding gear for this.  They wanted a rider wrapped in leather.  Leather is the most resistant to abrasion should you go down at high speed.  I bought a leather riding suit, but it took the assistance of another person to get it on me, and I felt incredibly claustrophobic in it.  I could hardly move, and I could not get it off by myself.  I had to control my heart rate and claustrophobic anxiety – and I was in my house.  When I got it off after having it on only ten minutes, I was soaked in sweat.  What would happen when I got out on the salt at 100 degrees?  I was worried.  I sent it back and got a bigger size, and then repeated for a bigger size still.  I still needed help getting it on and off, and was worried about the heat.

Chris had two Suzuki Hayabusa’s for me to ride.  One was a stock bike, 2010, 1350 cc, red, which tested on a Dyno at 200 hp.  The other was a white one that was Turbo Charged with a lower gas tank, special bodywork and modifications.  It tested at 320 hp!  It was an incredible beast.  It would spin the rear tire on the salt at any speed – even up to 180 mph.  I had to be very careful with throttle control.

Finally, in the late afternoon of Day 1, I was cleared to take my first run.  I got help putting my 25-pound leather suit on.  I put my boots and helmet on.  I walked to the start line where my team had the bike ready to go.  It was hot.  I was sweating in the suit from the heat and from being nervous.  What would happen?  How would this go?  Would I twist the throttle on a 320 hp motorcycle and spin out?  One way to find out….

I got on the Turbo bike at course 2 and waited for the starter to give me the signal that the 3-mile course was mine.  With slick tires, slippery salt, and 320 hp, I rolled the throttle on very slowly to not spin the wheels.  The bike felt good.  Real good.  Patience….speed coming up.  9000 rpm. Then I missed my very first shift!  My brain was used to shifting up, but this bike shifts down to go up a gear.  It reminded me with the motor zinging up to 13,000 rpm when it hit neutral.

The bike pulled strong as I let it loose.  I watched the conveyor belt of salt go under me faster and faster.  100 mph.  120.  Feels great.  I tucked.  I was worried that I would have trouble picking my head up far enough with my back and neck curved as they are.

The SCTA times your average speed between mile 1 and 2, 2 and 2 ¼, and 2 and 3.  My job to get my C license was to average between 125 and 150 in any one of these sections of the course.

130….140…feeling good.  I rolled more on.  I felt the animal I was on had so much more it wanted to show me.  150….155…and I rolled it down and pulled off after I saw the mile 2 marker. 

What a relief!  I could see forward while tucked (even though it was like looking through your upper eyelids.  I didn’t sweat to death in my suit.  I didn’t crash.  I could control 320 hp on a slippery surface.  Wow!  This was going to be ok after all…well, it’s ok so far. 

Sometimes we let the demons of fear stop us.  We dwell on how hard or scary something will be and the fear grows in us until it stops us.  Controlling fear and not manufacturing any more of it than is necessary is something we must do to live to our potential.  Whether we are in a spelling bee in second grade, sharing our ideas at a meeting, or doing anything we haven’t done before.

The salt courses closed at 5:00.  We only got one run in on day one.  It was enough.  We headed back to our hotel a couple of exits away in Wendover, the town where the Enola Gay took off from to end World War II.  Lots of history was made out here in the desert of Northwest Utah.  I felt I was a small part of it now.

Salt, Speed and Dust – Chapter 3

“Life begins at the end of your comfort zone” – Neale Donald Walsh

200 mph on the Bonneville Salt Flats in a motorcycle I had never been on before – that was the goal.  But there was more to it.  As it turns out the longest off-road race in the United States was a couple of days later – “Vegas to Reno”, 514 miles.  “Ok, let’s do that too – it will be epic!”  I was an experienced desert racer, and I had raced a 300-mile race in Nevada two months earlier.  “I got this”, I thought.

Ok, one trip, two goals, lots of planning and preparation complete.  One thing at a time.

We pulled onto the salt at Bonneville early on a Saturday morning.  The salt is very white.  The sun bounces off of it and you need dark sunglasses and a wide-brimmed hat.  The threat of exposure is real.

The texture is like rough finished concrete, smoother in spots, and rough in spots, with the occasional rut or hole.  Untouched, the salt has bumpy lines in it forming patterns.  It’s as if a thousand moles were lost under there.  I always wondered how thick the salt is.  50 feet?  200 feet?  I had no idea.  It turns out the salt is from 3” to 7” thick.  That’s it. 

Bordered by beautiful brown mountains, the white salt is a flat jewel in a valley.  I couldn’t help myself – I tasted it.  No surprise – it tasted like salt.

The organizers drag the course to make it smooth.  They have two courses.  One is three miles long with three miles to stop and one is five miles long with three miles to stop.  They prepare alternate courses.  Think of six runways parallel to each other. Speed Week goes on for six days.  On days one and two they will use one course.  The salt gets chewed up from accelerating wheel traffic, so on days three and four they use their first alternate, and on day five and six the second alternate.  I had no idea how important all this would be to my quest.  I was learning fast. 

That’s what happens when you do something new.  You have to learn even the very basics of it.   Here’s the line. Here’s where you start.  Here’s how you know when to start.  Here’s where you ride to.  Here’s what you do then.…

The whole event is put on by the SCTA – Southern California Timing Association.  It’s tightly controlled.  Step one – registration.  Step two – drivers meeting.  Step 3 – Rookie orientation.  They take you down the track in your car or truck and you get to see what the course is like, and where to turn out to the return road which is about 120 yards from the course parallel to it.  When you make a run, they do not allow you to ride or drive back to the starting line.  You have to be towed by your chase team or on a trailer to return.

We had 10 people on our support/chase team and three vehicles – an RV set up in the front row between courses one and two, a passenger van, and a flatbed truck with a box trailer to haul the bikes.  It’s a significant operation and necessary to get the job done as I would come to realize.

I was nervous.  I had never been on these bikes before, and I didn’t know if I could tuck tight enough and still see, given a big gas tank in your chest.  I didn’t know what it would feel like.

I kept telling myself that if anyone could do it, then I could too.  Hours went by in the hot sun and we took the steps to get to the starting line and get the bike out on the salt.

At tech inspection, I stayed in the background while Dean, our mechanic, and ex road racer stayed with the bike and the inspector.  We had the wrong tires they said.  They were not rated for over 200 mph and because of that, they put a speed limit on the bike of 200 mph.  We were not to exceed it.  There were debates and questions about whether the tires were safe at 200+.  In the end, the inspectors won, and we were not allowed to hit our goal unless we changed tires.  We were frustrated.

Then the inspector asked, “Where’s the rider?”  Dean pointed to me.  He asked me to come over and sit on the bike.  Then he said, “Ok, turn the ignition on”.  I looked down.  I hesitated.  I thought “Oh crap.  Where’s the ignition?”.  It wasn’t obvious.  I broke into an embarrassed sweat.  The inspector waited.  Here I was at Bonneville to take this bike over 200 mph and I didn’t even know how to start it!! 

I played like I was deaf and didn’t hear him.  The inspector finally reached over and turned the ignition on. 

This was going to be some experience….