The name 'Vincent' is often uttered in tones both hushed and reverent by fans of motorcycle history. Once you know even a little bit about founder Philip Vincent and his relentless pursuit of speed, it's not difficult to understand why. If the phrase "they don't make 'em like they used to" ever applied to anything, it's probably Vincent's entire engineering and design ethos.
Perhaps you've seen one of the most famous photos in all of motorcycling history: Rollie Free setting a land speed record of 150.313 miles per hour in 1948 on a Vincent HRD Black Lightning. That monumental achievement took place at the Bonneville Salt Flats, and the photo shows Free hanging onto the handlebars, Superman-style, wearing naught but his bathing suit in order to offer as little aerodynamic interference as possible.
