Mechanical problem leaves land-speed record still unbroken

WENDOVER — The time was right ... the weather, the track, the car and the driver were ready.

There was little doubt among crew and owner in the early hours on Monday that the 42-year-old land-speed record they were chasing would be history before noon.

Then, less than two miles into the record run, a blue haze filled the cockpit, and Mike Nish knew it was over. There would be no record today.

When the 27-foot-long streamliner stopped within feet of the pit area, a black pool of oil forming under the car told the story.

"I think we broke it. We broke the engine," Nish said as he climbed from the cramped cockpit. "We're done. It just let go."

The world record that speed car-owner Terry Nish wants so badly will stand for at least another year.

"I had a hundred things going through my mind that could have gone wrong, but the engine wasn't one I even considered," Terry Nish said as he stood back and looked at the car, his arms folded and eyes looking down at the salt.

The record in question was set in 1965 by Bob Summers at 409.27 miles per hour. It was the fastest an engine-driven, naturally aspirated car had gone. No car, fed by a carburetor or fuel injector, has been able to break the record.

The Nishes have come the closest. Mike Nish made a 386-mph run this year using a much smaller engine. It should be noted, too, that Summers' car was powered by four engines; Nish's streamliner is using a single engine.

The engine put in the car on Monday, said Tom Klein, one of the world's most respected engine builders, "is one of a kind. That engine is worth $100,000. Because of the design and engineering, it took a year to build."

Using a mix of nitro-methane and alcohol, the 673-cubic-inch engine was capable of creating 2,400 horsepower, which Terry Nish said was more than enough to run over 400 mph.

Once track officials straightened out a one-mile mistake, which was around 10:30 a.m., Mike Nish started the engine and began moving down the track from Floating Mountain, at the northern end of the salt, to the pits to the south. The plan was to make the return run going from south to north. Land-speed records require two runs, with the final speed being an average of the two.

"It started great," Mike Nish recalled. "It grabbed the salt and a mile and a half into the run I had it floored. I believed at that point it was potentially a 430 to 440 (mph) run."