Britain’s Bloodhound Land Speed Record racer is in trouble and the project’s owner has been forced to put it up for sale – highlighting once again that half the battle for any land speed record attempt is raising the funding to power a challenge to the start line.
Bloodhound LSR has already proved itself by running at over 600 mph in South Africa’s Kalahari desert powered by a Eurofighter Typhoon jet engine. The design also incorporates a Nammo rocket motor that, according to engineers, could send Bloodhound beyond 1000 mph.
Unfortunately, financial problems have plagued Bloodhound since its inception and the project has had several benefactors. Now Yorkshire businessman Ian Warhurst says he can no longer keep funding the effort.
“I’ve gone as far as I can with it,” he told BBC News. “I can’t put any more of my own money into the project, so it’s time for me to pass the baton to someone else to complete the job. And I’ll be cheering from the sidelines.”
Going in to 2020, with successful testing under its belt, Bloodhound had attracted sufficient sponsorship to see a record attempt. Since the Covid pandemic, however, the project has had to be mothballed.
Warhurst estimates that breaking the current 763 mph Land Speed Record set by Thrust SSC in 1997 would cost a further £8 million ($11 million). At a time when one buyer was prepared to spend £4.4 million on a Jaguar D-Type, and January’s auctions saw over £22 million spent on classics in some markets, it doesn’t seem too much to ask to fund a truly epic automotive endeavour.
Via Hagerty US
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