More record breaking

Elsewhere it is mentioned that the F. I.A. have now recognised the 1-mile distance for standing-start records; the motorcycle Federation, the F.I.M., have now recognised this distance as well. so members of the National Sprint Association recently held a records weekend on a 2-mile R..A.F. runway near York. Standing start mile International records for 250, 350, 500, 750, 1.000 and 1,300-c.c. solo classes were all established, and some existing British records were broken, while attempts were made on numerous existing records over the standing-start kilometre, in all cases the times being the mean of two-way runs.

The small group of record breakers represented the cream of the British motorcycle sprint world, all members of the N.S.A. and among the truly outstanding performances were those of Roberts, Rous and Smith, all riding sprint specials powered by supercharged 650-c.c. Triumph engines, competing in the 750 c.c. class. At the end of the attempts on the 1-Mile Roberts had beaten Smith by 3/1,000ths of a second, and on the kilometre Rous beat Roberts by less than 8/1,000ths of a second, and they both recorded one-way times of under 20sec.

Of technical interest were the standing-start attempts by Hagon with his supercharged vee-twin 1,151-c.c J.A.P powered machine, known as ” Leprechaun,” using a direct drive to the rear wheel, like an American dragster. He started his acceleration runs by standing the motorcycle on a spring-loaded central stand, with engine running and clutch engaged so that the rear wheel was revolving at maximum speed, and then pulling a trigger which released the stand and dropped the bike onto the ground! However he could not beat Brown on his supercharged Vincent who was doing orthodox clutch starts and using a gearbox.—D. S. J,