FLASHBACK: Top Fuel Harley-Davidsons on the (Vegas) Strip

As a generalization, motorcycling requires some degree of bravery. Well, bravery or idiocy, depending on who you ask, but you know what we mean. It’s a more dangerous adventure than driving a car, not because it’s an inherently dangerous thing to do, but because the people around motorcycles are even bigger idiots and don’t know how to act right.

So … remove the outside people, and motorcycles should be good, right? They’re really not that dangerous if you know what you’re doing right? Correct. Unless you’re converting them into some of the most absurd mechanical racing machines on the planet.

That’s what you see at places like The Strip at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway when the Top Fuel Nitro Harley-Davidson boys get together for a play date. This flashback video offers a glimpse at some of the runs at a 2010 NBRA event, and the amount of courage to drive one of these things is truly incredible. Not only do they wheelie at full speed half the way down the track, they also occasionally explode right beneath your ass. Think you might want to take a turn?

[Via Speed Society]