Nearly Six Decades After the Original, the New “World’s Fastest Indian” Is as Powerful as It Is Unexpected

Whether or not you grew up in a motorcycle family, if you know the Indian brand, chances are pretty good that it’s because of Burt Munro.

The 68-year-old New Zealander historically rode his home-brewed 1920s Indian Scout streamliner to a land speed record at the Bonneville Salt Flats back in 1967. In 2005, Anthony Hopkins starred in a biopic titled The World’s Fastest Indian about Munro that chronicled the Kiwi’s famous run.

It’s an enjoyable (if a little cheesy) film that helped bring Burt, Indian and land speed racing more into the mainstream light. If you haven’t seen it, it’s worth a watch — all the more so because the story has a new development.

Indian Motorcycle

Almost six decades after Burt Munro made history aboard that Scout, Indian has returned from Bonneville, triumphant in its attempts to honor his memory and set a new world record.

Taking a new crown

194.384 miles per hour. That was Tyler O’Hara’s two-way average over the course of his historic performance. After opening with an impressive 192-mph pass, he sealed the deal with an even faster run at a top speed of 196 mph. 

Along with being more than enough to shatter the 169.828-mph AMA 2000cc record that had stood since 1972, it also meant that he blew past Burt Munro’s 184.087-mph average. (If you want to get technical, the New Zealander was aboard a sub-1,000cc Indian Scout during his run, and he also supposedly rode to an unofficial top speed of 205.67 mph.)

Indian Motorcycle

Of course, in many respects, this was just another day in the office for Tyler O’Hara. As a two-time King of the Baggers Champion, he’s well-acquainted with hucking big bikes around at ridiculous speeds.

Similarly, even though the Indian Challenger RR is based on a stock touring motorcycle, it’s a race bike through and through. It’s honed for high performance.

Indian Motorcycle

A challenger to speed

Nevertheless, to ensure that O’Hara and the Challenger RR would be successful in their mission, Indian’s engineers had to make several key modifications.

In the pursuit of improved aerodynamic efficiency, they lowered the chassis, narrowed the fairing and saddlebags and modified the fuel tank for a more tucked riding position. Cheating the wind pays dividends.

Indian Motorcycle

However, because the engineers didn’t go to the same extremes in their streamlining efforts as Burt Munro, O’Hara and the Indian Challenger also needed power to rocket their way to a record-breaking average.

As such, the team worked with S&S to tweak the engine (which, mind you, already has tons a high-performance hop-ups), going through the 112-cubic-inch PowerPlus V-Twin engine with larger throttle bodies, ported heads, lightweight race cams and a higher compression ratio.

When running a high-octane race fuel and a trick exhaust, the changes manage to boost output even beyond that of the fire-breathing KOTB race bikes. Though Indian hasn’t specified how much power this example was making, a stock Challenger delivers about 125 ponies from the factory.

Indian Motorcycle

Riding on some race-worthy slicks and clad in a bright livery, it looked every part the record-setter, judging from the photos.

Your closest comps

While you’d obviously need a team of engineers to build a land speed racer comparable to the bike that set the record, oddly enough, Indian did sell a limited run of its King of the Baggers Challenger RR race bike to the public.

Now, at $93,000, it wasn’t cheap. And, given that just 29 examples were built in total — none of which were street legal — it was about as exclusive as it was impractical to own.

Alternatively, you could always go for the stock Challenger. Though it starts at a far more reasonable $26,499, you’ll obviously need to do far more work to get it up to Bonneville-spec. But that’s precisely the kind of project that would make a land speed legend like Burt Munro proud.

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