Buy used:
£3.48
FREE delivery January 8 - 11. Details
Or fastest delivery Tuesday, January 4. Order within 9 hrs 7 mins. Details
Used: Very Good | Details
Condition: Used: Very Good

Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet or computer - no Kindle device required. Learn more.

Read instantly on your browser with Kindle Cloud Reader.

Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.

QR code to download the Kindle App

Enter your mobile phone or email address

Processing your request...

By pressing ‘Send link’, you agree to Amazon's Conditions of Use.

You consent to receive an automated text message from or on behalf of Amazon about the Kindle App at your mobile number above. Consent is not a condition of any purchase. Message and data rates may apply.

Flip to back Flip to front
Listen Playing... Paused   You're listening to a sample of the Audible audio edition.
Learn more

Follow the author

Something went wrong. Please try your request again later.


Thrust: The remarkable Paperback – 1 Oct. 1999

4.9 out of 5 stars 33 ratings

Amazon Price
New from Used from
Paperback, 1 Oct. 1999
£3.48
£150.00 £3.48

Product description

Amazon Review

Ever since Dr Johnson declared 200 years ago that no man travelling at 20mph in a coach could possibly "continue to draw breath", there has been no shortage of nay-sayers. They said it over and over to Richard Noble and his team, but they went ahead anyway and in October 1997 ThrustSSC, driven by RAF Squadron leader Andy Green, smashed through the sound barrier to set the first supersonic land speed record of 763mph.

This absorbing and richly illustrated book tells of Noble's obsessive quest for speed, beginning as a six-year-old watching John Cobb's 200mph jet boat Crusader and ending in triumph in the Nevada desert. There is as much financial as technical detail--Noble imaginatively and profitably stalked the Internet for donations as corporate sponsors fell by the wayside--and a jingoistic subplot as the Brits and Yanks vied with each other to achieve the sonic boom first.

But mostly this is a human story of struggle, achievement and the peculiar meanings of success. "We'd got through this", says Noble, "we'd succeeded. But success can be very sad once you've got over the initial elation. Suddenly it's all over and it can never be savoured again." --Nick Wroe

From the Back Cover

They said it couldn't be done. Sceptics warned that as a car approached 750 m.p.h., the shock waves generated when it hit the sound barrier would either force it off the ground like an aeroplane or tear it apart.

Richard Noble, the modern embodiment of the swashbuckling British speed-seeker of yesteryear, was used to that kind of blinkered thinking. He had held the title of the Fastest Man on Earth since 1983, when his Thrust2 car set a new world land-speed record at 633 m.p.h. Critics had argued that he would fail then, too. Noble likes nothing better than a fight and in the late 1990s, as a gripping Anglo-American race began to create the world's first supersonic car, he was determined to risk everything to achieve this world first for Britain.

On 15 October 1997 Noble's ThrustSSC, driven by ice-cool RAF Squadron Leader Andy Green, smashed through the sound barrier to create the first supersonic land-speed record at 763 m.p.h. The ThrustSSC team had beaten the Americans, thumbed its nose at the sceptics, and realized what seemed an impossible dream. It was a triumph for British engineering, technology and derring-do.

This is not the tale of unbroken success, but a story of disappointment and struggle, and of the entangled emotions behind one of the greatest engineering achievements of the twentieth century.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Bantam Books (Transworld Publishers a division of the Random House Group) (1 Oct. 1999)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 416 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0553812084
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0553812084
  • Customer reviews:
    4.9 out of 5 stars 33 ratings

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.
Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.
Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more

Customer reviews

4.9 out of 5 stars
4.9 out of 5
33 global ratings
5 star
93%
4 star
7%
3 star 0% (0%) 0%
2 star 0% (0%) 0%
1 star 0% (0%) 0%

Top reviews from United Kingdom

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 7 June 2015
Verified Purchase
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 5 September 2020
Verified Purchase
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 9 May 2021
Verified Purchase
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 18 June 2014
Verified Purchase
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 11 September 2015
Verified Purchase
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 17 March 2013
Verified Purchase
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 12 April 2014
Verified Purchase
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 13 September 2021
Verified Purchase