Speed King of Queens Breaks a Record

Louise Ann Noeth Eric Ritter behind the wheel of Team Vesco's 444 streamliner at the Bonneville Salt Flats.

When Queens native Eric Ritter tripped the timing lights last month at the Southern California Timing Association‘s World Finals at Utah's Bonneville Salt Flats, setting a record for its engine class at 339 miles an hour, he also earned a lifetime membership in the exclusive 300 m.p.h. chapter of Bonneville's prestigious “200 MPH Club.” In the process he became the first New Yorker to earn that distinction, according to S.C.T.A. records.

Mr. Ritter, a 50-year-old auto mechanic and former motorcycle racer, was driving the Team Vesco 444 yellow-and-white streamliner, a 26-foot-long purpose-built speed machine that rips along a nine-mile course with a scant two inches of ground clearance.

“Eric earned his ride by being a good team member for more than 20 years,” said the car's owner, Rick Vesco, referring to the 15-member volunteer crew. “He's very meticulous and conscientious, things you count on when people's lives are on the line.”

After performing double-digit hours of physically demanding mechanical labor as the car's crew chief, Mr. Ritter quickly assumes a tranquil “Zen state” to drive at vision-blurring speeds. He has cultivated a routine to control his heart rate, breathing and nerves that he terms “slowing down the fuel flow” to develop quick, riveting concentration â€" a necessity when driving at 300 miles an hour.

Ritter, who made 17 runs in excess of 300 m.p.h. before setting a Class C national record of 339 m.p.h. on Oct. 5, said that he drove mostly b y seat-of-the-pants feel. “Your butt is the best steering mechanism around. It will tell you everything that vehicle is doing and it will know it before your head does.”

The new record came after an oil line fitting burst, necessitating an engine swap. Mr. Ritter and his teammates completed the work in 10 hours, leaving him physically spent even before he put on his fire suit. At that point his task was to “drive like you stole it,” as Mr. Ritter said.

Speeds from two separate runs are averaged to earn the top spot in each class. But during the first of Mr. Ritter's two record-setting runs, a giant mosquito appeared, flying around the cockpit to land dead center on the Plexiglas windscreen. Goodbye life-sustaining concentration.

“It was him or me,” said Ritter, who took his right hand off the steering wheel to backhand the bug while moving at almost 340 m.p.h. “I had to take him out.”

Ritter's second run, at 338 m.p.h., was uneventful - if you can call such speed mundane.

“Our safety rules are very strict,” said Miriam Macmillan, chairwoman of Bonneville Nationals, speaking with mock sternness. “No one but the driver can be in the car. We will need to review the validity of Mr Ritter's record since he admits to having a passenger.”

Lee Kennedy, S.C.T.A.'s car technical chairman, was more straightforward in his praise. “The 444 is always very well prepared, very few teams have more racing experience than they in dealing with salt conditions,” he said. “They make setting a record look easy, but it would take rookies a lifetime to do the same thing.”