By Wes Siler, Hell For Leather

Bill Warner’s wild 1,000-horsepower turbocharged Suzuki Hayabusa has been called “the world’s fastest motorcycle” after hitting 311.945 mph. It isn’t the world’s fastest and that time is unofficial, but it’s still freakin’ fast.

The man who built and rode the bike is Bill Warner, a fish farmer and marine biologist from Florida. He made the run Sunday at Loring AFB in Loring, Maine. Warner says it wasn’t the speed that was scary, but shedding it.

“At Loring, there is a mile shutdown to slow the vehicles, and I used every bit of it,” he said. “The bike was bouncing, hopping, skipping and sliding. Needless to say, I got it stopped safely. It was a little scary.”

Not to diminish Warner’s impressive achievement, but in the pedantic world of land speed record racing, titles like “world’s fastest” are taken very seriously. The record for fastest speed recorded by a motorcycle is held by Rocky Robinson at 376mph, but he was on a streamliner. Warner was making a run for the sit-on, non-streamlined record, but missed it because he didn’t complete a return run for a two-way average. Our understanding is the non-streamliner record stands at 278.6 mph, a run Warner made last year at the Texas Mile.

The runway at Loring has room for a 1.5-mile course. It’s absolutely stunning that Warner could reach 311 mph in such a short distance.

Photos: David Whealon

En route to 311.945 mph. Warner says it isn’t the speed that’s scary, it’s the stopping.

Somewhere in there is a turbocharged 1,299cc Suzuki motor good for 1,000 horsepower and about 490 pound-feet of torque. Get the full specs over at Hell For Leather.

Video: BrocksPerformance/YouTube