MOTOR-CYCLE RECORD

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 111, 6 November 1937, Page 28

MOTOR-CYCLE RECORD

ITALIAN'S SUCCESS

■; Fietro-Taruffl, one,of'ltaly's leading motor-cyclists,, has ■'■. established & new world's motor-cycle record, attaining a mean speed of 169.4 m.p.h. The performance would be achieved on his enclosed streamlined Gilera machine, upon which, last May, he covered 121.38 miles in the hour on one of the special motor roads near Brescia.

Although the speed over the flying mile recorded by the Italian establishes new world's figures, a higher speed in one. direction aas ..' been achieved. East April. (the DunlopPerdriau Bulletin recalls) the English rider Eric Fernihough (Brough Su-perior-Dunlop) was officially clocked to cover a mile near Budapest at 175 m.p.h.' Unfortunately, when making his return run over the mile, and with the speedometer showing he was doing 175 m.p.h.,' a chain sprocket sheared when' the greater, portion of the course had been covered.' As the mean of two rides in opposite directions is necessary ta secure official recognition of the world's short-distance records, Fernihough's change of winning the world's motor-cycle mile record was wrecked. On the same machine and course, the Britisher put up the world's fastest motor-cycle speed for the standing-start mile, his mean speed being 109.7 m.p.h. Taruffi's machine has a 500 c.c. 4cylinder water-cooled engine, twin overhead camshafts, and is supercharged. The engine is said to develop 80 b.h.p. at 8000 r.p.m. The rider, when in the saddle, is completely enclosed in an aluminium shell, the domed front of which is glassed in.