In 2006, Harley-Davidson did a thing. When it did this thing, some wee came out of me. It came out of a few other people, too. Which was perfectly understandable, as you will come to understand.
Harley-Davidson, for reasons I can only put down to a bunch of good ol’ boys sittin’ around the big meeting table at Harley HQ, sippin’ hillbilly bourbon and possibly doing chemicals, decided the company was going to build a drag bike.
For the people.
“Hey, Vern! What say we build a kick-ass drag-bike?”
“Hell, yeah! We can take it drag-racin’ and write it off on staff development.”
“That ain’t what I’m talkin’ about, Vern. We gotta build a drag-bike to sell to the public. Let them go drag-racin’.”
“You might wanna lay off that there powder some, Billy-Ray.”
“Hear me out, Vern…”
Vern must have heard Billy Ray right the hell out, because in 2006, Harley debuted its VRXSE V-Rod Destroyer (or “Destroyer” for short) to the world.
Which is when our wee came out.
Harley-Davidson had built the world’s first production drag bike. It only made 646 of these Destroyers, according to the Audrain Automobile Museum, which now keeps a beauty on display, so it is one of the rarest bikes Harley’s ever created. And some 20 of them made it into Australia.
To put this into an automotive perspective, imagine if Ford suddenly decided to build a production drag car. And not one of those soft-bellied, marshmallow-engined special “performance-engined” vehicles – but a proper, not-road-registerable, rompin’, stompin’, bag-smokin’ quarter-mile missile that accelerates like a fighter jet and sounds like the carpet-bombing of Tora Bora.
This is just what Harley had built – an out-of-the-box pro-drag bike complete with slicks, wheelie bars, a hissing air-shifter and a proper multi-stage clutch set-up specifically for the drag strip.
Its “Destroyer” name was perfect, or if you’d ridden it like I did, you may prefer to address it as “Master”. It would like that.
After all, it is incontestably the most brutal and intimidating two-wheeler ever to don a set of handlebars and pretend it’s a production motorcycle. Because while it technically is a production motorcycle (in that it’s got two wheels, a motor and a set of handlebars, and it was certainly produced), it behaves more like an artillery round.
It is a purpose-built comp-monster designed to do nothing but go dak-crappingly fast in a straight line and make more noise than an exploding mountain. You could no more register it and ride it to work than you could punt Schumacher’s Ferrari through traffic. And I did ask. Over and over. Until I was told to go away, stop bothering the Harley staff, and do something else.
For starters, the Destroyer doesn’t idle. It explodes. Repeatedly. The explosions begin immediately after you’ve pressed the electric start button, laid down on top of it like an Aztec sacrifice, and made your peace with God.
There are no footpegs anywhere near the gear lever. The footpegs are either side of the monstrous drag-racing slick, which you’ll find just in front of the factory-supplied wheelie bars. And you’ll be grateful for them the second you dump the clutch and the rubber digs deep, firing you forward with a force in excess of 2Gs, while your brain struggles to cope with the noise and acceleration and the clutchless, don’t-back-off-the-throttle-ya-soft-cheese-boy gear-changes that are the life-force of professional drag-racing.
The Destroyer accelerates with the single-minded wilfulness of a homicidal maniac. Relentless, seething power propels you down the strip faster than your body and brain can cope with. Just remember to breathe.
It’s the ultimate naked power trip, and a fitting addition to any family garage.
And yes, I rode it. At Willowbank Dragway, and it went kinda like this…
READY … SET … SHIT!
In the hands of a professional drag racer, the Destroyer can post mid-nine-second passes with an exit speed of 146 mph (235 km/h).
A Top Fuel bike, on the other hand, is an even scarier monster that lives at the very top of the drag-racing food chain. These exit the traps at a touch over 260mph (418km/h), and do the quarter-m mile in about six seconds.
I am not a professional drag-racer. And I could no more attempt to ride a Top Fueler than I could pilot a fighter jet. But a Destroyer? Yeah, give that here.
Which is how I found myself at Willowbank, astride a Destroyer, with a coin-sized chunk of seat death-clamped by my anus, and my mouth dryer than a nun’s underpants.
Drag racing is a simple sport. See the green light, pin the throttle, and Bob’s the uncle you never had, right? And in theory, and outside the pub after closing time, that’s all there is to it. Except professional drag racing on a dedicated drag-strip has bugger-all to do with theories and everything to do with surgical precision and snake-like reaction time.
It is every bit as hard to do well as it is to be polite to a parking inspector. And it’s so full of tiny-but-vital details, all of which must be remembered and implemented in nanoseconds. You really don’t have the time to shit yourself at just how fast you’re going. Or what will happen if things go wrong.
But don’t worry. Get it right and a pass on the Destroyer will only take about nine-and-a-half seconds, and it goes like this…
- Lie down on the bike and note the puddle of water just in front of your front tyre. Try not to cry at the explosions just under your chest. That is the motor at idle.
- Do not roll into that water. Waddle the bike around the puddle and back into it, so that your front tyre remains dry.
- With the back tyre in the water, grab the front brake and stand up off the bike. Pin the throttle and dump the clutch. The back tyre will immediately begin to howl and produce tornadoes of smoke.
- Sit back down and gently ease off the brake so that you roll out of the water with the back tyre still spinning. Now stop. Breathe deeply and rejoice that you have successfully warmed up your all-important drag slick.
- Now waddle the bike forward while keeping your eyes on “the tree”, basically a white post with lights on it. At the top are two white lights. Underneath are three yellow lights and a green one.
- Inching forward using your legs, you’ll notice the top white light will blink on. Stop. You are now in “pre-stage”.
- Inch forward a touch more and you’ll see the second white light go on. Do not move. You are now “fully staged” and ready to drag race. Too bad if you don’t think so, because right about then the yellow lights will cascade down in sequence until the green light goes on, at which time you’d best be on your way to the end of the quarter-mile.
- Reaction time is everything. The perfect reaction time is 0.400 seconds. Anything under that and you’re disqualified, anything over that and you’re adding precious time to your pass. The trick is to dump the clutch the instant you see the third yellow light.
- The fun starts, because once that clutch is dumped and the throttle is maxed, the Destroyer sets about doing its thing and all you can do is try and keep up.
- Keeping up consists of you changing gear each time the big red shift-light in front of your face flashes. It does this about every two seconds, just as the Destroyer hits 9500rpm in each gear. Your elapsed time depends on how well you meet that shift-light’s demands, while also trying to find the footpegs with your flapping feet and keeping the throttle wide open all the way.
- Don’t even think about backing off to change gear or grabbing some clutch. The Destroyer’s designed to be held flat-out and all your gear-changes are made with your left thumb hitting the button marked “shift”.
- Get it all right, and it’ll be over before you realise. Ten seconds, give or take one either side, is not a long time. But the Destroyer will ensure it is a good time.
- Once you’re past the finish light, button off and sit up so your body acts like a windsock to slow you down. Do not touch the front brake. The strip is covered in a super-sticky compound called VHT, which may cause you to cartwheel the bike end over end if the front tyre bites under brakes.
- Aim for the return road by leaning the top half of your body in the direction you’d like the Destroyer to go. Be nice and gentle. It doesn’t steer or handle like a normal motorcycle.
- Once back at the start, bolt for the toilet and empty your bladder and bowels if you haven’t already done so.
I made six passes that day. I once managed to get under ten-seconds. Twice I managed to be around the 12-second mark. I was always either screwing up my reaction time, or forgetting to breathe, or doing some other dumb random shit that interfered with the Destroyer setting perfect runs. This is why drag-racing is so wretchedly addictive. You need OCD-levels of attention to detail, both personal and mechanical, to get the best quarter-mile possible. And you are always pursuing that. The garages at drag events are full of red-eyed madmen who have sold their houses and chased their wives and children away in pursuit of this.
In their defence, it is a lot of fun. Your monkey brain will be ever so pleased with it all.
And while I have in my life drag-raced street-bikes for shits and giggles at various drag-strips during sanctioned, run-what-you-brung public events, and even engaged in some possibly illegal and immoral street-drags along deserted roads with like-minded men and scantily-dressed women, nothing ever came close to having a run on Harley’s Destroyer.
How could it?
So what's the big deal here?
I know some of you looked at this and shrugged. A bike that runs mid-nines down the quarter? Pfft. “My HP2/Hayabusa/S1000RR/Panigale can do that.”
Maybe it can. It should, right? Your mate told you. You read it on the Internet. Get your reaction time right, don’t muff a gear change, and yeah, you should be seeing mid-nines and better on a good day.
Let me burst that lovely pink bubble for you. These are the verified numbers (ie. Actual drag runs with the commensurate timeslips from reliable sources) I have unearthed by digging into the chatroom myths surrounding superbikes.
- Suzuki Hayabusa: 9.7 sec @ 150 mph (Brocks Performance);
- Kawasaki H2: 9.62 sec @ 154 mph (Cycle World);
- Ducati Panigale V4S: 10.18 sec @ 148.88 mph (Cycle World);
- Aprilia RSV4 Factory: 10.38 sec @ 147.79 (Cycle World)
- BMW S1000RR: 10.31 sec @ 144.55 (Cycle World)
In 2006, when the Destroyer was released, things were much the same. The fastest streetbikes on earth, The GSX-R, R1, and the Fireblade, were running mid-tens on a good day. The numbers above are for more recent models.
Twenty years has seen road bikes hit the 200-plus horsepower mark (310 for the H2R), and the Destroyer made 165 horses and weighed about 110 pounds more. Once you factor in the electronics modern bikes come with, like launch control, anti-wheelie control, and traction control, then add winglets, fairings and whatever downforce they may add to your shooting match, your production superbike is still a touch slower down the quarter-mile than a production Harley built in 2006.
The Destroyer had none of those electronic aids. But it made thunder. It had wheelie bars. You could not register it for the road no matter who you bribed. It would not go around corners. But it would shoot itself down the quarter-mile like no production bike since then.
Because it was not like any production bike ever made. It was a thing unto itself. A dedicated production drag-bike built by a factory that didn’t ask “Why should we even built this?” It asked “How the Hell can we NOT build this?”
Then it said “Hold my beer”, and did.
Enjoy a video (not of me, of somebody actually talented in the art of drag racing, flogging a Destroyer down the quarter mile in 2016) below:
Technically Speaking
Still think it’s just a blinged up streetbike?
The Screamin’ Eagle Destroyer is powered by a 1,300cc (79 cu.in.) V-Twin Revolution liquid-cooled racing engine with 105 mm (4.13 in) cylinders and a 75 mm (2.95 in) stroker crankshaft. The cylinders feature high-strength ductile iron sleeves. The forged pistons produce a compression ratio of 14.0:1. Special high-flow racing cylinder heads feature CNC porting, competition valves, springs, seats and keepers designed to work with new high-lift/duration cams. The 58mm throttle bodies have tuned velocity stacks.
A racing transmission features modified input, actuator, and output shaft assemblies and an MTC multi-stage lock up clutch with an electric-over-air shift system. The chain final drive utilizes a 530 DRZ chain, the same as the one used on the Screamin’ Eagle/Vance and Hines Pro Stock Bike racing motorcycle. The front and rear sprockets are designed to facilitate easy track-side drive ratio changes. A three-piece, 2-into-1 ceramic-coated exhaust system features stepped headers and a turn-out collector. The engine is tuned to run on 103 Octane petrol and makes its peak horsepower at 9,700 rpm.
A special main wiring harness supports a programmable, multi-mode shift light, a two-stage launch box linked to the shift lever, and race-programmed ECM. The Destroyer shipped with a Screamin’ Eagle Race Tuner and is data-acquisition capable.
Chassis modifications include a special swingarm with custom rear-axle adjusters, solid rear struts and a wheelie bar with side panels. A friction-type steering damper is standard. The Destroyer is equipped with a single-disc front brake and braided brake and clutch lines.
The Destroyer is shod with a 3 x 18 inch (7.6 x 45.7 cm) Dunlop Screamin’ Eagle front slick tire and a 7 x 25-inch (17.7 x 63.5 cm) Dunlop Screamin’ Eagle rear slick.
Rider accommodations include a mini-instrument panel, forward race-position risers and a drag handlebar, handlebar controls designed for drag racing, and include an emergency shut-off tether. Rear-set footpegs and a brake lever are positioned on the swingarm. The race seat features a high-rise back cushion. The Screamin’ Eagle Destroyer features an Electric Orange and Black paint scheme.
