Land Speed Louise sent this remembrance of Ralph:
Ralph Hudson's first trip to Bonneville was in 1971. He was attracted by the simplicity of it: go from here to there as fast as you can, faster than anyone else ever has, in your class. At 20 yrs old, he was pretty new to racing of any kind and really didn't know what to expect. Ralph found that reading the rule book more carefully would have been a good idea. He had missed a few important details that took an extra day of work, on the salt, to make his bike legal for the class.
Hudson's racing mentor was Kenny Young, a crusty old 2-stroke tuner, who suggested the Bonneville trip. They were both excited about trying to break a record, on the salt. Primarily due to Young's tuning, Hudson set three records that year and thought it was easy. 'Little did I know . . .' he recalled. 'It was so exciting to see all the different things that people had imagined, built and brought to the salt. It made me start dreaming of a better race bike. I love fabricating, working on engines, always trying to improve things, I was hooked!'
For many years, before he ever thought of actively racing, Hudson read every motorcycle magazine he could get. He was intrigued by the German NSU team, which came to the salt in the late 50s. The incredible speeds they recorded and photos of the bikes showed Hudson that aerodynamics must have played an important role in their success. For Hudson's second Bonneville try, he modified a road race fairing, put a three cylinder engine in a drag bike chassis and clicked off 150.75 mph, about 20 mph faster than his first, production style bike. Unfortunately, a burned piston dashed record hopes, but he was excited about the speed, and the potential of the bike.
'I thought I had it all figured out,' he laughed. 'Later, I read an article about streamlining that pointed out that what's behind you is more critical than what?s in front. That changed everything, I?d never thought of that!? He sketched out plans for a new bike, but never built it, as life stepped in and he began building props and mechanical effects for TV commercials, got married, had a family and no time for racing. Fast forward thirty odd years, his son graduated from college and Hudson was single again. He had road raced back in the 70?s, and still had his old factory Suzuki 500 twin. A friend talked him into getting it running and taking it to the vintage road races.
At the AHRMA races at Daytona, in 2009, Hudson happened to meet a racer from San Francisco, Jim Hoogerhyde. Over margaritas, they discovered that getting a red hat was high on both their lists, but they had different ideas on how to go about it. Hudson sketched a picture of his bodywork on a cocktail napkin, for the umpteenth time and decided he better get after it before he got much older!
A frantic few months later, Hudson earned the Bonneville 200MPH Club life membership with an average speed of 210mph riding a bone-stock 1000cc Suzuki street bike covered with his slippery bodywork. With the help of Ted Silver, his crew chief, they have pushed the record to 220mph , 225mph and with help from Carpenter Racing, up to 239.976 mph, normally aspirated!
The obvious next step was to turbocharge the bike and see what it would do. After a crash at 218mph in 2013, no Speed Week in 2014 and 2015, they went back to the salt with high hopes in 2016. They blamed the salt, but couldn?t get the bike to go much over 230mph.
El Mirage was a different story. In October of 2016, the bike ran 246mph, on the rev limiter for the last .4 miles of a 1.3 mile course. After some calculating and a sprocket change, they got back in line expecting to do better, but the wind came up and the meet was over. In November, on Saturday morning, they were expecting to put a significant increase on their previous speed, but a broken chain took out the water pump, the clutch release mechanism and damaged the bodywork. A trip back to LA was necessary to get parts and fix the bodywork. On Sunday morning, they got in line, not quite as confident as the day before and made a good run, Ralph?s best ever, 266.399 mph! The fastest motorcycle speed ever recorded at El Mirage, 14 mph faster than the previous top speed! Ralph says that with a little more work, there should be a few more mph left to find.
All told, with several different bikes, Hudson has broken 39 records at Bonneville and El Mirage. He still holds eight records at Bonneville and eight records at El Mirage. He?s been SCTA motorcycle points champion three times.
None of his records have been broken by anyone else??yet.
How much more speed is left? Only time will tell. See you at the races!!!
