The video of the V8 motorbike, Krazy Horse, raised a lot of interest and comments, with quite a few about The Michigan Mad - E.J. Potter. Wally Pushkey and I met E.J., and Mark Read has given us permission to publish this excerpt from his book...

In the early 1970s, Keith Williams, the builder and owner of the Surfers Paradise International Raceway, had managed to entice some of the best and most exciting American drag racers to come out to Australia and experience the great atmosphere of Surfers Paradise in Queensland. These legends shipped their cars to Australia to race, and one even brought a legendary V8 motorcycle. I still remember the excitement of watching guys like “Wild Bill” Shrewsberry racing his wheel-standing Dodge the full length of the quarter-mile and running quicker on two wheels than most racers of the day could achieve on four. Don Hampton was there in his twin Chevy-engined funny car, Two Bad. There were heaps of Aussie legends, including Ash Marshall, Ron Wanless, and my favourite, Vic Wilson, to name but a few. Vic Wilson drove Bill Fredericks’ hydrogen peroxide powered rocket car, Courage of Australia. I was so inspired watching this incredible car run that I was hooked on rocket power, knowing it would eventually feature in my racing career.The legendary E. J. Potter (The Michigan Madman) was also there with his Chevy V8 motorcycle, Widowmaker. E. J. was a great guy who definitely lived up to his “Madman” nickname. He would rev his bike up until the engine was screaming and launch it off a stand. His bike would snake up the quarter-mile with his back tyre leaving rubber all the way up the track. He was only small in stature, but had a massive presence on the drag strip. The Krazy Horse team, consisting of Wally Pushkey, Bob Allsop, Earl Jordan, and me, were excited to see E. J. Potter run his bike, but this was mixed with some frustration. The Australian National Drag Racing Association (ANDRA), the governing body of Australian drag racing, had recently banned us from racing our V8 motorcycle on any of their sanctioned drag racing tracks, much to our disappointment. Krazy Horse was built before anyone in Australia had ever heard of E. J. Potter and some of his other crazy machines. We watched him put on an amazing performance at this meeting, running an eight-second pass. This was bloody incredible when you consider that the Australian top fuel dragsters of the day were not running much quicker, and some were just cracking the seven-second barrier. We went straight back to ANDRA, asking why we couldn’t run our V8 bike, and someone from the USA could. At the next meeting, Krazy Horse fronted up at Surfers Paradise, where the officials were told we were allowed to race. The big difference between our V8 bike and Widowmaker was that we used two lanes with Krazy Horse sliding sideways, speedway style, from lane to lane. We ended up covering a lot more track, but these were demonstration runs, and we were paid to entertain the crowd. I think we certainly did!I still feel bad about how the Krazy Horse team welcomed E. J. when he arrived. We threw him into Keith William’s swimming pool fully clothed as a welcome to Australia gesture. However, he took it in his stride with a big smile. E.J. also put me in contact with a legendary US race car designer, Arvil Porter, who built and raced some very unique and incredible machines. Later, we did a lot of work on designing an air and gasoline rocket-powered motorcycle, which sadly was never completed due to Arvil’s passing. I have really fond memories of these times, especially E. J. Potter and the friendship we shared at Surfers Paradise. He sadly died in 2012 from complications of Alzheimer’s disease in his home state of Michigan at the age of 71. Rest in Peace, mate.Extract from "ROSCO The Fastest Aussie on Earth" by Mark J Read.@followers @top fans Meremere Dragway SCEDA - Southern California Drag Racing Association Drag Racing DragRacingnewsblog Australian Drag Racing Nationals History Australian Drag Racing History and Memorabilia Australian Drag Racing News, Info & Chat New Zealand Drag Racing Association UK Drag Racing News & Nostalgia Australian Street Rodding Scarf & Goggles Speed Record Club Land Speed Racing USA ... See MoreSee Less

As far as we are aware, no videos exist of Rosco or Wally Pushkey riding Krazy Horse in the 70s. We used a real photo and asked AI to generate one. If anyone has a video, we would love to see it. Best 1/4 mile time 9.1 secs 172 mph

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