Awesome video of 240hp motorcycle racing up Pikes Peak

Watch the awesome onboard video of Chip Yates riding a 240hp electric (yes, electric!) motorcycle up Pikes Peak on a practice run this weekend.

Pikes Peak Hill Climb is a 95 year old race that starts halfway up Pikes Peak mountain in Colorado and ends at the summit. The elevation rises from 4700ft to 9400ft on a 12.42 mile course with 156 turns.
As the years pass, more and more electric and hybrid vehicles have joined in on the racing to promote and refine their respective technologies.

Chip Yates, on board his electric motorcycle, raced to the top of Pikes Peak while videotaping the whole thing. It's a great view of the speed and the sights, definitely worth a watch if you don't mind mediocre, light-punk music (I turned it down a bit, but was still having a great time watching him go.) The video would have been a bit cooler if we simply heard the electric bike whine it's way to the top, but I don't make the videos.

This is absolutely great for the motorcycle and automotive industry, even if you hate electric vehicles. Racing and war produce quick bursts of invention and technology. One day, instead of batteries, electric vehicles will have some sort of hydrogen power plant with double canooter valves inside of them to provide power to the electric motors. By then, the electric motors and the system will be so well developed that it would be a natural and welcome transition.

This video then is not of just an electric motorcycle going up a mountain, it's progress, it's invention, it's science and technology. We, as humans, can all eventually reap the benefits of the research and development, not to mention the time and expense, by this guy getting hurled up a mountain on two wheels. I love it.