Slashdot Mirror
New Motorcycle World Speed Record, 367.382 mph
An anonymous reader, apparently a member of the BUB racing team, wrote to let us know that on Thursday, their crew set the new ultimate motorcycle world speed record at 367.382 mph with the BUB Seven Streamliner at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. The Seven is powered by a 3 Liter, turbocharged, 16-valve V4 engine that produces a claimed 500 hp and 400 lb-ft of torque at 8500 rpm. The pilot, Chris Carr, hit 380 mph during the run.
My personal opinion is that geek has moved far beyond the 1980's definition of pocket protectors, glasses, and a calculator. Geeks come in all flavours now, from classical computing and math geeks all the way into sports and automotive geeks.
My personal opinion is that geek still means carnival folk who bite the heads off chickens. "Nerd" or "boffin" are my preferred terms for people who are excited or obsessive about technical things. "Geek" has too many connotations of falsity, they remind me of the web-bubble MBA types who wouldn't like being called nerds, and think that "geek" has cooler connotations. But there's nothing cool about biting the heads off chickens.
... and then they built the supercollider.
3x terminal velocity of a person in a balloon suit. Terminal velocity depends on shape, density, and size. An aerodynamically designed motorcycle is going to beat a person in a loose-fitting garment in that area any day of the week.
Further, terminal velocity is not necessarily "terminal" the way you're making it sound (a mouse walks away, a horse splashes and all that. see Haldane), and has nothing to do with horizontal translation anyway: terminal horizontal velocity, the speed at which wind resistance and other forces balance, if you're not including the powerplant in those forces, is precisely zero.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
As a motorcyclist with gray in my beard, too, I totally disagree.
Two wheels, power other than human-generated applied through a wheel to the surface (not jet thrust); that's as much a motorcycle as there is. Sure it's purpose is limited, but that's true for all motorsports-specific bikes.
No way is a supermoto racer as useful a street bike as any of the ones I have at home. The MotoGP and World Superbikes are too small and cramped for a lot of people, and can't even be left unattended without a stand that isn't part of the bike. Drag race and hill climb bikes have wheelbases that are utterly impractical on the street. There are customs that are beautiful sculpture, but uncomfortable, to sit on, yet they have engines driving wheels and CAN be ridden. All of them are motorcycles. Just because the low-drag fairing is closed and the rider/pilot needs assistance getting seated (road racers have to have assistants steady their bikes while mounting, too), doesn't disqualify that as a motorcycle.
Got watch "World's Fastest Indian" and stop flaunting your narrow, overrated opinion of what constitutes a "motorcycle".