There is always a story in the background.
The bike had just been painted by Molly....all spiffy and purdy.
He called me and told me he needed fotos of the record run because Sports Illustrated skewered him on his first 314+ record and they
told him if he used any fotos in an advertisement, they would blow the whistle on him because they knew he had no one there doing
still fotos. He called me and said he needed fotos and could I be there "tomorrow?" In those days it was a matter of walk into the airport,
but a ticket and fly and that included a case for a $1000 tripod at no extra airline charges. I was there the next morning and I told him
Motorcyclist Magazine wanted a shot for the cover of the next issue. The only problem was that after he had called me he dropped
it and skinned the right side. So the left was to only side to shoot and that pointed the wrong way for the cover. I shot the left side, jumped
into the car, drove to SLC and sent the film to them using a cabin attendant as the courier. I sent Dale Boller, the editor of
Motorcyclist her name and he met her at LAX. 4 hours after I did the fotos on the salt the film was in the lab. The next day the cover
was designed. We didn't get the entire cover. They put some long limbed doll on a 50cc scooter above us. She was the insurance policy
in case I didn't get the film to them.
The next day Don ran two passes. Both were in the 314 MPH speed for the mile. The fractions were not the same but the whole numbers
were. Don was satisfied because Kawasaki received their desired number and a scuffed paint job didn't matter.
Oh ya...... on fire? At the end of the first pass, from Floating Mountain toward the highway, there was a fire between the engines. Don
stepped out and found the leaking oil was soaking the header wrapping. He re-wrapped as much of it as he could, turned to me and said,
"Freud meet me at the 7 mile marker. Here's a fire bottle. It will be on fire when I stop. Just kill it before I even get out." Marlo
Treit was with me. That made it lovely. He could extinguish the fire and I could do the fotos. Don took care of the new record and
stuffed it to Sports Illustrated. He also stopped 20 feet before the 7 mile marker. Marlo took care of the fire.
Remember, he ran 314 MPH and the motorcycling world was astonished.
Bill did it on his own and didn't even have a fire to put out. It was just about 35 years after Don's run.
But...he did create a fire storm with that number.
I made all of that up except the part about Bill's speed.
Find your copy of Motorcyclist Magazine with the lady on the 50 cc bike on the cover and nail me to the
abandoned telephone poles that had the Pyrex insulators.
FREUD
