‘Syko’ smashes land speed record

A Yorkshire based engineer has set the British land speed record for three wheelers. Graham Sykes rode his 3900cc V8 machine, called ‘The Syko’ at Elvington Airfield near York, reaching a top speed of 180.39 mph.

Sykes has been developing the bike, which has two wheels at the front, for over 20 years but the record attempt caused problems: a destroyed clutch was replaced on the eve of the attempt and 8 silencers were added to bring the noise to the 105Db maximum.

The two-way average speed of 168.73mph is 5.4mph faster than the previous average set by Stan Whitton. Sykes said: “I’m absolutely delighted with the results, and I’d like to say a huge well done to everybody involved”.