Many serious motorcycle fans have been aware of New Zealand speed bike racer Burt Munro’s escapades; however, the rest of the world fell in love with the man in 2005 when Anthony Hopkins starred as Burt in the movie “The World’s Fastest Indian”.
Born in 1899 in Edendale just out of Invercargill, Burt spent twenty years highly modifying a 1920 Indian Scout motorcycle before achieving his first New Zealand speed record of 120.8mph (194.4km) in 1940. Spurred on by this success, he turned his attention to World Speed Records, and during his ten visits to the Lake Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah, USA he famously set three world records in 1962, 1966, and 1967.
In 1967 at 68 years of age and riding a 47-year-old highly modified Indian Scout motorcycle, Burt Munro set his last and most famous under 1000cc world record with an average speed of 183.586mph (295.45km), a record that still stands today.
Although Burt passed away in 1978 at 78 years of age, to this day his life is celebrated in various permanent displays around Invercargill. Hardware store E Hayes and Son’s pays tribute to Burt with two of his bikes on display which he sold to them after a stroke in 1977 hampered his riding ability, and since 2006 the Burt Munro Challenge, a 6-day motorcycle festival is held in different locations including Oreti Beach, where Burt originally trained for the Bonneville Salt Flats as well as Teretonga Park raceway, the most southern FAI approved raceway in the world.
Winding the clock forward to 2021 when the AMA King of the Baggers racing series was formed in the USA, a completely unique and over-the-top racing class that continues to blow racing fans away with amazing performance being delivered by what are cumbersome 620-pound machines. While their on-track performances have proven to be beyond expectation, even nearing the lap times produced by Supersport machines, at some point someone at Indian Motorcycles must have asked the question: “How fast will one actually go?”
With that in mind and a long history with the Bonneville Salt Flat land speed racing and Burt Munro, Indian Motorcycle recently took a King of the Baggers Indian Challenger race bike to Utah and this Cycle World article followed the speed attempt.
Indian Motorcycle & Tyler O’Hara Set 194-mph Record at Bonneville – cycleworld.com
Running in the AMA 2000cc APS-AG class, Tyler O’Hara set a new record of 194.384 mph, an average of his two official runs of 192, followed by a 196mph pass. It was an amazing effort and one that on face value sounds simple – line up and the open the throttle as much as you can and see what happens, but as the team found out it certainly has its challenges.
A 196 MPH Race Bagger at Bonneville – Indian Motorcycle
Image courtesy Indian Motorcycles
