3,000cc V4 motorcycle returns to Bonneville chasing 400mph record
Chris Rivas is heading back to Bonneville with a 2,997cc turbocharged V4 and one very ambitious target: breaking the 400mph barrier.
Trying to ride a motorcycle at close to 400mph takes a particular kind of person. Courage is an obvious requirement, as are exceptional reactions and a willingness to climb into something that looks more like a ground-to-ground missile than a motorcycle. One slightly unexpected quality required is patience, as this land speed racer has found out.
American racer Chris Rivas returns to the Bonneville Salt Flats for the 2026 Bonneville Motorcycle Speed Trials (BMST) from 23-27 August, once again hoping to get a proper run at Rocky Robinson's 376.363mph (605.697km/h) record.
It sounds straightforward enough. Turn up with a two-wheeled tube with a great big engine in it, climb in, and go very, very quickly. In reality, Rivas has already discovered that land speed record chasing at Bonneville rarely works like that.
The trouble is, there are so many variables, from the condition of the salt to the direction of the wind. Any single, seemingly small factor could decide whether a team gets a shot on the salt or not. His previous attempts have been repeatedly interrupted by strong winds, while poor salt conditions have also made it difficult for the BUB Seven Streamliner to operate as intended.
“I guess anyone who is new to the sport would be anxious and trying to get it going and that’s kinda the way it is in a lot of other forms of racing,” said Rivas, “but the biggest issue with Bonneville is just that you have to be patient while you figure out what the salt conditions are going to give you. That’s just how it is and when you’re competing for the highest level of motorcycle speed I guess that’s multiplied.”
That makes this year's attempt less about simply finding another few miles per hour and more about getting the right conditions for the machine (I’m not sure I can actually call it a ‘bike’!) to do what it is designed to do. Rivas will be the only rider at this year's BMST specifically targeting Robinson's absolute record, and his stated ambition is to finally break through the 400mph barrier.
The machine certainly has the minerals to make that ambition sound plausible. The BUB Seven is a 2,997cc turbocharged V4 streamliner designed and built by Bonneville legend Denis Manning, with Rivas lying flat inside its long, narrow bodywork. He is secured by a seven-point harness and relies on pneumatic skids to keep the machine stable as the speed builds. That last part is important, and as Guy Martin found out while trying to crack the same record in the Triumph Rocket 3-powered streamliner, this isn't just a case of pointing the thing down the salt and pinning it.
Rivas has already experienced 235mph on a sit-on motorcycle at California's El Mirage dry lake beds, but he says the experience changes considerably once you're inside the BUB Seven. The streamliner has to be balanced on its skids, while its large tail section can become vulnerable to crosswinds as the speed rises.
“I’ve run at the El Mirage dry lake beds on a sit-on motorcycle going two-hundred-and-thirty-five miles per hour on dirt and that’s really not as sketchy as people might think, but things change when you’re in a streamliner and you have the skids that have to do their thing and you have to be able to keep balanced – the machine has a tail section that catches any kind of wind.”
After last year's attempt, Manning took the BUB Seven back to California and reworked parts of its suspension and skid system. Those changes are intended to make the streamliner more capable of dealing with less-than-perfect salt, although they have not been properly tested. That inability to test properly before an event is another peculiarity of chasing a record at Bonneville. Unlike a MotoGP, World Superbike or Road Racer, you can’t just wheel these things out of a van and take them for a spin.
“There’s no place really even just to go down the road on it. It’s a one-time-a-year event at Bonneville, that’s it. You can’t take it anywhere else because it’s thirty feet long, it doesn’t turn and has one purpose in life. I wish I could take it out at the weekend and practice, but there’s no possible way to do that anywhere.”
“I’m excited to go and be a part of this. To me it’s a legendary and iconic motorcycle and there are only a couple of people in the world that are doing this, are at the top of the game and are active and that’s Rocky Robinson and myself and so we’ve actually become pretty good friends. He’s a great guy and has been very supportive and given me a lot of encouragement for this year, and it’s great to have that camaraderie.”
There is a good chance, then, that the biggest obstacle facing Rivas this year won't be another motorcycle. The recent Buell Leviathan attempt at Bonneville showed just how difficult it is to translate a huge theoretical top speed into a clean run across the salt, but Rivas is operating in an entirely different spectrum.
His target is a record that has stood since 2010, and one that has survived more than a decade of increasingly serious attempts. Getting close to 400mph is one thing. Finding the few minutes when the wind, salt, machine and rider all line up is another.
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Simon (AKA Toad) has been working within the motorcycle industry for more than twelve years, and a member of the motorcyclist family since birth. Growing up around British-built single and twins, it was inevitable that a life on two wheels was on the cards, from a very early age!
