lvsalt: What a great photo and I’m sure great memories you must have from that first encounter! No wonder why we have so many photos of the same cars on the same days...
Those colors on the Gyronaut are so bittersweet that I get choked up just seeing them. On the one hand, those 1970 colors represent the pinnacle of the Gyronaut’s capabilities. On its trial run, it was geared for 275 and timed at 264.5 with a 6mph headwind, which could have bested its 1966 record run of 245.667 by a full 10%. But on the other hand, they are also the colors of an unfulfilled potential as, on the following day, it was going 270 at Mile 4 and still accelerating when all hell broke loose. As Tremulis recalled:
"Oh God, I felt as though I had been hit in the gut by a battering ram. The Gyronaut suddenly leaped off-course. Bob thought a gust of wind had caught him and he tried desperately to fight it under control instead of popping his chute to save himself and blow the record run. What he didn't know was that it was not the wind; the front suspension had disintegrated." When it was all over, Bob Leppan nearly lost his arm and had to undergo numerous surgeries and painful rehab over several years. Alex Tremulis felt personally responsible for Leppan’s pain throughout the subsequent years and shouldered much of the blame as he felt that the aerodynamics around the front wheel opening may somehow have contributed to the premature failure of the components and that he, of all people, should have been able to foresee the weak link. When he did talk about it, he spoke of the incident with a very heavy heart, even though he lived his life much as one of his favorite (mis)quotes: “The meek shall inherit nothing, PERIOD!”
Back to the first hand, here’s one of my favorite photos as it captured the crowning achievement of Leppan in the Gyronaut. This was taken on its next-to-final run, just after being clocked at 264.5…
Topic: Old Bonneville Pictures (Read 1316064 times)