One of the most significant and significantly under reported occurrences in drag racing during the 2013 season happened late in the racing year. Said moment was the final round match up of Sweden’s Peter Svensson and America’s Larry “Spiderman” McBride in the final round of Top Fuel motorcycle at the Haltech World Finals in Bradenton, Florida back in November. Why was this significant? Mainly because it pitted the two best top fuel motorcycles in the world against one another in the final round of what could be considered one of the great motorcycle drag races of all time. Svensson rightly claims to have the quickest Top Fuel Motorcycle in the world and Larry McBride is arguably the greatest living fuel bike racer on planet Earth. This was a nitro powered prize fight of epic proportions. It is VERY uncommon in drag racing to have guys on opposite ends of the Earth running comparably with identical combos. It is even more uncommon to get said competitors together on the same strip in competition that isn’t a match race and to have them meet up in an actual competition final round for all the beans. What you are about to watch is a confluence of events that has very seldom happened in any form of drag racing, let along nitro powered machines!

The video comes from a camera mounted on Svensson’s helmet and it shows the fateful final round that motorcycle drag racing fans have been waiting to see for a long, long time. As both men waded through their respective side of the ladder, fans on both sides of the ocean were chewing their nails and hoping for the two titans to meet in the final. As it worked out, they did but you’ll see that it was fairly one sided and McBride took the win by a significant margin. Like all good prize fights, this one left everyone wanting a rematch. Count us among them.

What’s completely insane about this video is watching McBride come by with 4-foot flames launching out of the headers, wheel in the air at 300+ feet and just motoring away from Svensson like he’s stuck in neutral. You’ll hear Svensson click his bike off early as it obviously didn’t perform to the standard he wanted and the race was over by roughly half track. We have run thousands of drag racing videos on BangShift but in terms of modern drag racing footage, this is some of the coolest you’ll ever see. Both in terms of the riders in it and their performances.

From the perspective of an announcer and from that of other guys who have been around this stuff for a long time, it is literally shocking to see McBride motor by with flaming fury during this match. Also, stick around until the end and note the formal quickness of the handshake the men share in the showdown area after the bikes are stopped. Think there was a LITTLE bit of pride, tension, and intensity involved in this deal? Only LOTS.

Thanks to Bret Kepner for the video tip!