![]() ![]() As well, these long, triangular-bodied missiles handled surprisingly well, as proven to the press during the run-up to the record attempts. Two years after they bowed out of racing, NSU spent a considerable sum developing six streamliners of truly innovative configuration, using a ‘hammock’ riding position for the rider, which kept their height, and thus their frontal area, extremely low. ‘Happy’ Mueller won the 1955 title on a production-racing Sportmax, the first privateer to win a World Championship (at age 46). The black line on the salt is painted by a truck afresh every year: the distance to those mountains in the background is 25 miles NSU had developed a devastatingly successful range of 250cc and 125cc racers in the mid-1950s, winning 5 World Championships in a 3-year span from 1953-55, the last after the factory had officially withdrawn from Grand Prix racing. ![]() Wilhelm Herz with the Delphin III streamliner before the record attempts, with a clean machine. A traveling machine shop had also been shipped from Germany, with enough spares and equipment to deal with any mechanical emergency. ![]() ![]() von Heydenkampf and Technical Director Viktor Frankenberger were on hand to oversee the mechanics, technicians, and officials (including Piet Nortier, from the F.I.M., in charge of timing). In 1956 the factory shipped over a quiver of streamliners to Utah, arriving on July 25th, and nothing was left to chance NSU’s Chairman Dr. In the midst of the worst motorcycle market in German history, the NSU factory opted to go big with a remarkable multi-bike assault on the World Speed Record on the Bonneville Salt Flats, taking on six capacity classes: 50cc, 100cc, 125cc, 250cc, 350cc, and 500cc. ![]()
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