When asked why he had done it, Noble replied: “For Britain and for the hell of it.” It was the realisation of a childhood ambition sparked when six-year old Noble saw ‘Crusader’, the boat built for land speed legend John Cobb, moored on a Loch Ness quayside.
His journey from backseat day-dreamer to World Record breaker would be characterised by boundless energy, unswerving enthusiasm and the unshakeable belief that any obstacle could be ground down to become an opportunity.
This faith was tested many times during the six years of the Thrust Project as Noble and a small team of engineers and volunteers overcame technical and financial challenges, freak floods, failures and a very public 180mph crash, to ultimately set a record that would remain unbeaten for fourteen years.
Since Donald Campbell reached 403.10 mph with his iconic Bluebird CN7 in 1964, the Land Speed record had become the preserve of younger American racers, who challenged the existing rules and harnessed the might of surplus military jet engines to rapidly push the limit far beyond the 500mph mark.
In 1970 Gary Gabelich achieved a two-way average speed through the Measured Mile of 622.407mph, in the spare and elegant ‘Blue Flame’ – to this day the only successful rocket-powered Land Speed Record car. There the record stood, seemingly out of reach, until a Twickenham-based enthusiast championed the design and build of the UK’s first jet powered Land Speed contender.
The Thrust2 team had several record attempts ruined by the weather: Bonneville in ’81 was washed out, Bonneville in ’82 was under two feet of water when they arrived, this prompted the team to discover the Black Rock Desert in Nevada, a dried out lake bed that offered 12 miles of flat baked mud that perfectly suited their solid wheels. However, after a few runs it started raining.
The team returned in 1983 and made eleven runs as they learned how the car handled at speeds above 600mph. They had many more setbacks along the way including days of torrential rain, high winds and an engine surge which could have destroyed the jet. Fortunately the Avon was unharmed and the team was able to set the record of 633mph on October 4 and return to the UK victorious.
“This car is part of my family, it took over six years to get the Land Speed Record and I’ve been over 600 mph eleven times in it,” Richard Noble said at the time.
Noble went on to direct the Thrust SSC campaign which, in 1997, culminated in RAF fighter pilot Andy Green becoming the first person to break the sound barrier on land. Their record of 763.035mph still stands.
Today, Noble is leading The Bloodhound Project, a global education initiative focused on a 1,000mph land speed record attempt. The new car builds on the legacy of Thrust2 and SSC, combining space, aeronautic and Formula 1 technologies to cross the Measured Mile in just 3.6 seconds.
Noble believes Thrust SSC would not have been possible without Thrust2. "It generated a huge amount of publicity and interest and resulted in a three-way challenge between ourselves, the McLaren F1 team and Craig Breedlove with his car Spirit of America – Sonic 1," he says. "The experience we gained fed into the Supersonic car programme and the subsequent success of Thrust SSC, with Andy driving, created this enormous global following that enabled us to start The Bloodhound Project.”
For the first time in Land Speed Record history, going fast is not the team’s main objective. Instead, it is to use Bloodhound to showcase science, technology, engineering and mathematics in the most exciting way possible, and inspire a future generation of engineers and technologists.
Noble’s childhood dream has now evolved into a multi-faceted, worldwide movement, with followers in over 220 countries, 5,500 UK schools using Bloodhound in the classroom and a small army of ambassadors sharing the excitement with audiences on five continents.
SME borrowing: investment or a matter of survival?
A new report has highlighted the divide between businesses borrowing to survive and those seeking long term development capital.
Despite the level of public and political attention focused on the shortage of finance for smaller firms, less than one in five (17 percent) small to medium sized businesses (SMEs) has attempted to raise finance in the past 12 months with 40 percent of applications rejected, according to a new report by venture capital company, Albion Ventures.
The Albion Ventures Growth Report 2013, which examines the challenges and opportunities faced by 450 SMEs with a combined turnover of over £1.6bn, reveals a clear divide between stagnant businesses that are borrowing to survive and those that are seeking finance in order to expand in the future.
Of those who have attempted to raise capital in the past 12 months, more than one in four (28 percent) were looking for long term development capital, while under a third (32 percent) wanted working finance to keep their business going.
The largest demand for working finance was from sole traders, accounting for 62 percent of applications. The research shows that companies with a larger turnover had fewer problems finding access to finance.
Regionally, companies in the North were most likely to see raising finance as a threat to their business while it was seen as a minimum risk in London, where sources of finance tend to be more accessible. On a sector basis, manufacturing businesses were most concerned about how a lack of access to finance would impact on their growth potential, followed by retailers.
The report also highlights significant differences in attitudes towards raising finance between companies that have an optimistic and pessimistic outlook on their future growth prospects: nine in ten pessimists looked to secure finance to pay day-to-day bills compared with fewer than two thirds of optimists, suggesting that many companies are relying on debt to keep themselves alive.
Nearly all pessimists applied for a bank loan or overdraft while optimists applied for a number of a different finance options including equity, mezzanine and invoice discounting. Furthermore, optimists are much more likely to seek finance in order to develop their business, invest in new equipment and build new products and services.
Albion Ventures managing partner, Patrick Reeve says that while SME cash deposits have been net positive throughout the financial crisis and are continuing to grow it is perhaps not surprising that only one in six SMEs have attempted to raise finance in the past year.
"It is commonly perceived that a shortage of finance has become inextricably linked to the fate of smaller businesses, yet the evidence from our report indicates that policymakers should avoid focusing on this issue at the expense of other areas that firms are more concerned about, notably red tape, regulation and a shortage of skilled staff,” he adds
Meanwhile, Cormac Hollingsworth, a director at New City Network reinforces the view that the UK’s economic recovery relies in large part on a thriving SME community.
"To continue to improve the policy mix it’s vital that we develop an intimate picture of what is preventing small businesses from growing," says Mr Hollingsworth. "While a shortage of bank lending is clearly a factor, it appears to have received a disproportionate level of attention. The bigger challenge is shifting the current reliance on debt towards equity finance and backing companies that have the strongest growth prospects.”
Les Hunt
Editor