In this wonderfully retro 1963 film Craig Breedlove breaks the land speed record at the Bonneville salt flats, driving a jet car named Spirit of America.
Breedlove lost the record in 1964 to Tom Green but returned to Bonneville in the same year and took the Spirit of America to over 500mph, reclaiming his record. After his record setting second run the Spirit of America lost its parachute brakes and hurtled out of control for 5 miles across the salt, then took out a series of telephone poles before crashing into a pond at 200mph.
Breedlove survived the accident miraculously uninjured and set both the world speed record and the Guinness World Record for the longest set of skid marks ever made, clearly making him one of the coolest men to ever walk the Earth.
Ben Branch has had his work featured on CNN, Popular Mechanics, the official Smithsonian Magazine, Road & Track Magazine, the official Pinterest blog, the official eBay Motors blog, BuzzFeed, and many more.
Silodrome was founded by Ben back in 2010, in the years since the site has grown to become a world leader in the alternative and vintage motoring sector, with millions of readers around the world and hundreds of thousands of followers on social media.
The Harley-Davidson 11K was the American company’s first purpose-built V-twin racer – it was developed by Bill Ottoway, an early engineering genius who had been poached from Harley-Davidson’s rivals over at Thor. Harley-Davidson 11K Board Track Racer Although Harley-Davidson motorcycles had been used in competition previously, including a first race win in 1904 at The Milwaukee Mile with the…
How to Build a Car – The Autobiography of the World’s Greatest Formula 1 Designer is an essential read for any racing fan – Adrian Newey is by far the most successful Formula 1 car designer in history, his designs have won 10 Constructors’ Championships, with 3 different teams, and in the ’80s he spent…
The Lotus Elan is a British sports car with a cult following around the world, since it was first introduced it’s had an impact on the motoring world that can still be felt today almost 60 years later. Perhaps the greatest accolade the Elan ever received was when Formula 1 and supercar designer Gordon Murray…
The story behind the design of the Volvo Amazon is quite complex and takes in influences from a number of sources. Volvo had recruited Jan Wilsgaard from the Handicraft Society School (which is nowadays called the HDK, School of Design and Crafts). The young Wilsgaard’s first design work for Volvo was a large V8 powered car called the Volvo Phillip made in 1950.
The book MotoGP™ Technology by Neil Spalding is officially licensed by MotoGP™, and it’s widely recognized as an essential book to get your hands on if you want an in-depth working knowledge of modern motorcycle engineering. Neil started racing motorcycles in 1980 and enjoyed a long club career – winning two championships in his competitive…
This Land Rover Defender 1:10 scale remote control model from Tamiya sits on a full four-wheel drive chassis with lockable differentials, oil-filled coil over dampers on all four corners, a live rear axle, and independent front suspension. The Land Rover Defender is a 4×4 that needs no introduction, it’s a descendant of the original Series…
