At Bonneville, motorcycles don’t always look like Harleys and Hondas, but two wheels are two wheels. And when chasing 300 mph on two wheels, you’ll need a lot of aerodynamic help. That’s plenty evident in Valerie Thompson’s “7” streamliner, aboard which she became the fastest woman ever on a motorcycle. Thompson spends much of her year drag-racing motorcycles and making standing-mile runs, but earlier this year, she rode this streamliner to a best run of 304.263 mph, figuratively carving her name into the salt and its record books.
Here’s another great video from the Bonneville Stories YouTube channel that gives a taste of the pre-run preparation along with some great onboard footage from inside the two-wheeled streamliner. There aren’t a whole lot of other places in the world where you’ll see anyone running second gear to 200 mph. The Denis Manning-built streamliner features a custom-built, 3.0-liter V4 engine that puts out 500 horsepower. The streamliner has run as fast as 367 mph, so we hope to see Valerie back aboard it again trying to chase bigger numbers.
a 2 wheeled streamliner for sure, a motorcycle? although i think art arfons believed he could go even faster on a 2 wheeled platform, this streamliner here looked stable at speed!
I couldn’t fathom going 300 MPH on 4 wheels, never mind 2 wheels! Well done Valerie!