Ever since the advent of slo-mo video, we’ve been able to watch some of drag racing’s most incredible moments in frame-by-frame action, with an opportunity to dissect the carnage at a level never even thought of in the times of standard-def television broadcasts. 

European Top Fuel bike rider Steve Carey went for the ride of his life recently at the Santa Pod Raceway in England. As a slow-mo clip, there’s no audio attached to this incredible video, but the chance to watch as he attempts to make his way down the track becomes an exercise in “Did that really just happen?!?” rather quickly after the video begins to play. 

The launch looks OK – well, as OK as a Top Fuel bike launch can be – but just as Carey hits the sixty-foot mark, all hell breaks loose. The bike goes into an insane amount of tire shake before dipping to the right, whereupon the frame digs into the tarmac. From there, all Carey can do is hang on and try taming the beast.

After the frame digs into the track surface, the bike swings wildly in the other direction, and then it becomes an exercise in survival, as Carey dives for his life and somehow manages to escape the motorcycle’s end-over-end-over-end flips to end up somewhere near the 1000-foot mark. From 60 feet to 1000 feet in the blink of an eye – most of it rolling and flailing around like a ragdoll as the bike disintegrates beside him.

Truly an amazing spectacle, but more importantly, Carey is alive, safe and sound, to tell the tale.