Records keep going

Sam Whittingham does it again. Last night he broke the record again and reached 82.82mph.
This is the 10th time he has set a new record in the 10 years the event has been running.
He wasn't the only one to break a record though, Barbara Buatois riding the Varna Diablo 3 clocked a speed of 72.534mph then on another ride she clocked 75.46 to become the fastest European outright and the fastest woman ever at the event.
Greg Westlake went 41.5, 42.3, then 43.49 for a new arm powered trike record.

Copied from the battle mountain thread on recumbents.com

Some historical perspective of the significance of tonight!...

THURSDAY Sept 18, 2009 EVENING SPEED TRIALS RESULTS
BATTLE MOUNTAIN, Nevada
Speeds emailed to me by Craig Johnsen, Chief Timer

SAM WHITTINGHAM, 82.819 MPH, 133.284 KPH, Varna Tempest
WORLD RECORD - 10th time setting a record at Battle Mountain, on the event's tenth anniversary! The fastest cyclist in the world! It's Sam's 7th time being timed over 80 mph on the course. Only one other challenge remains! ... Sam, the first man over 70, 75, 80 mph has his sights on 85 mph. Short of that, can he be the first over 135 KPH or 83.9 mph? Sam is and continues to be phenomenal! He is The Man at Battle Mountain! Before Battle Mountain, the record for human powered speed stood at 68.723 mph, 110.593 kph by Chris Huber a professional cyclist in the Cheetah. This was set in 1992 in Colorado. Sam raised this mark by the following amounts with (year): 72.41, 72.74 mph (2000), 76.61, 77.03, 77.59, 80.55 mph (2001), 81.00 mph (2002), 82.33 mph (2008), and now 82.43 mph, 82.819 mph (2009). So he's personally increased the record by over 14 mph / 22.68 kph in ten years.
Note: The newly repaved stretch of Highway 305 outside Battle Mountain, which the racers have raced on is contributing to higher speeds. Significant lobbying was done by the event organizers Al and Alice Krause, working through NDOT and the local town of Battle Mountain to make this happen!

BARBARA BUATOIS, 75.458 MPH, 121.437 KPH, Varna Diablo III
WORLD RECORD - FEMALE, EUROPEAN RECORD, First Lady over 75 mph, 120 kph, becomes 4th fastest cyclist in the World, matches feat of being 4th fastest in the One-Hour. Georgi predicted 75 mph (120 kph) was possible by Barbara at the Ford event. Historical Note: Barbara achieves speed of 75 mph once thought to be the upper limit of human powered speed predicted by a computer in the 1989 if you cloned two Fast Freddy Markhams, put them in a Double Gold Rush, which later built, and took them up to 11,000 foot elevation in Colorado (over double Battle Mountain's 4600 foot elevation) with the maximum 2/3 of 1% downslope allowed. This was published at the speed championships that year.

Sam and Barbara duplicate their feat of setting both Men's and Women's One-Hour records on the same day at the Ford Human Powered Vehicle Challenge, two months earlier on Sunday July 19, 2009. Team Varna is the first HPV team to have both Men's and Women's Top Speed and One-Hour records. Georgi Georgiev, the builder of these wonderful Varna masterpieces, must be so proud!
Note: only one other time has the Men's and Women's 200-meter record been set the same day at Battle Mountain. This was on Tuesday of the first year of the event 2000 - when Sam (72.41 mph) and Andrea Blaseckie (54.04 mph), Sam's wife, both set records, the first world records set at Battle Mountain.

YANNICK LUTZ, 73.067 MPH, 117.590 KPH, ALTAÏR2
PERSONAL BEST, stays at the 7th fastest cyclist in world spot, Fastest student-built vehicle ever, French Men's Record. No university built machine has ever gone over 70 mph before IUT Annecy - University of Savoie in France achieved this feat, five times now at Battle Mountain. Yannick is a 36-year old, experience recumbent rider, who is considered a "test pilot" for the bike, and can help improve its design with his feedback. He is currently taking graduate classes at the university and is managing a shop in his spare time. He is very strong rider, though as Philippe, their teacher has pointed out, IUT Annecy has a few students that are in national team, and 3 former students are actually road biking professionals and did the Tour de France 2009.

ERIC WARE, 71.070 MPH, 114.377 KPH, Wedge
Personal Best, Joins 70 mph plus club, becomes the 8th fastest cyclist in the World. Team Eric Ware, Mark Anderson and John Jackstone have made it a historic five riders to have topped 70 mph at one event at Battle Mountain! Participants and observers are happy for Eric and Mark Anderson, they came to Battle Mountain last year, and worked almost 20 hour days for six days straight and only got one run in with the top off. Now all that hard work has paid off! Their new Mueller Windwrap fairing head bubble too is working well.

GREG WESTLAKE, 43.495 MPH, 69.998 KPH, Avos Arrow
WORLD RECORD, Arm Powered, 4th time in event, Historical note: exceeds the first legendary leg-powered HPV record of 43.02 mph by Ron Skarin in 1974. Ron was pedaling Dr. Chet Kyle's upright streamliner. He was an Olympic cyclist, later in the Hall of Fame. That speed started off the modern-day human powered speed championships. Now Greg, using only arm-power has exceeded that!

RON LAYMAN, 66.595 MPH, 107.175 KPH, Primal II
Personal Best, joins 65+ mph club. Becomes 17th fastest cyclist ever. Ron is approximately 27 years old, an alumni of Cal Poly where he first began racing these form of speedbikes at Battle Mountain in 2004. he came agonizingly close to 60 mph with a 59.9 mph run that year. Last year he came back as an alumni and topped 60 mph 3 times. This year, he goes over 65 mph in a updated version of the Primal 1 he rode last year. The Primal II has the head bubble removed for a smaller frontal area. George and Carol Leone, advisers of the Cal Poly HPVs, are behind the design of Ron's last two bikes.

ROB HITCHCOCK, 60.663 MPH, 97.627 KPH, Kyle Edge
below his Personal best of 63.91 mph in 2006, but showing increasing speed as the competition continues one more day. Rob showed similar speed improvements that year as well. The Kyle Edge was designed by Matt Weaver in 1990s when he was just 24 years old. Eight years later Matt raced it to 78.02 mph in an infamous duel with Sam Whittingham at Battle Mountain 2001. Sam first exceeded 80 mph that year. This vehicle is still the 2nd fastest HPV in the world. It was designed to achieve laminar flow and uses a video camera for the rider to navigate.

Mike Mowett
IHPVA Records Committee
Check out my list of the world's fastest at
http://www.wisil.recumbents.com/wisil/fastest_list.asp