Offerings to the God of Speed

This Roger Donaldson documentary preceded the director's work on The World's Fastest Indian and fuelled his interest in Burt Munro whose motto was 'fix it and try again'. In 50 years, he had some 250 motor blow-ups, usually because the con-rods or cylinder sleeves couldn't take the pace.

With basic equipment and astonishing ingenuity, he would rebuild the engine ready for the next try. He made cylinder linings out of cast-iron drain pipes and fabricated con-rods from steel Ford-motorcar axles. To make a flywheel he cut a coin-sized slice from a hydraulic ram, and used a steam-driven hammer to flatten it out to the correct diameter. This film documents the ingenuity and can-do attitude of a man who went on to 'wow' the world by breaking land speed records on a bike of his own making.