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Wendover • After waiting 12 years to make its return to the Bonneville Salt Flats, the world's fastest wheel-driven vehicle is still waiting to make its first run.

The big news during the 65th annual Speed Week was the return of the Turbinator, the streamliner the late Don Vesco raced 458.440 miles per hour with a top speed of 470 miles in 2001.

That was the fastest wheel-driven vehicle ever built, and though many have come close over the last dozen years, no one has managed to break the record.

Don's brother Rick decided to bring the car powered by a helicopter engine back this year after he spent much time in his southern Utah garage working to make it faster and safer.

But the Turbinator failed to run Tuesday when safety inspectors refused to okay a modified cockpit system designed to protect driver Dave Spangler of Dana Point, Calif. That was fixed Wednesday but, according to Rick Vesco's wife Jinx, mechanics fired up the big streamliner Wednesday and experienced trouble with the oil pressure. They were working on the issue and hoped to make a run Thursday morning.

Spangler said a lot of small things needed to be done to get the Turbinator II ready for racing.

"There is no problem we can't fix," he said as he iced a sore back. "We will get out as soon as we can."

The return of the Turbinator has caused quite a stir.

"This is our first time back," said Jinx, who serves as the historian for a Vesco team. The family's racing history dates back to the 1930s, when Rick and Don's father, Johnny, got the speed bug in Southern California. "We weren't interested in breaking our record. But Poteet and Main [owners of the Speed Demon] are getting close. We still have it, so we thought it would be time to bring it back."

The ultimate goal during the late summer and fall land speed trial season is for the Turbinator to become the first wheel-powered vehicle to go over 500 miles per hour.

Famous Salt Flats cars such as Gary Gabelich's Blue Flame Special and Craig Breedlove's Spirit of America used jet thrusts, not wheels, to go over 600 miles per hour.

Rick Vesco, the former Brigham City motorcycle dealer who now lives in Rockville in the shadow of Zion National Park, said he has been too busy to get emotional about bringing the big streamliner out again. He is the designer and builder of the Turbinator.

He lengthened the Turbinator II three feet to 36 feet long, something Jinx Vesco said would give Spangler more room, more stability and more cooling power. The vehicle also has a lighter, more streamlined carbon fiber body.

Jinx said St. George artist Wes Jacobson put an airbrushed painting of Don Vesco on the nose of the streamliner so the family could say he was still the first to go over 500 miles per hour.

"No one has driven the car other than Don Vesco," said Spangler. "It's an honor to get to drive it. … There is a lot we don't know. When it might go 500 miles per hour, we haven't got a clue."

In addition to Speed Week, there are a number of other land speed racing events scheduled for the Salt Flats between now and the first week of October. Many of the big streamliner crews seem to be working out the bugs this week for record assaults later in the year, especially at the invitation-only Mike Cook's Shootout September 12-16.

The late Johnny Vesco began the family's involvement in racing in 1933, first driving on dry lakes in California. He came to the first Speed Week in 1949 at Bonneville. Ask Jinx and she will show you a scrapbook with a program and a pit pass from that initial event.

The family's other car, known as the Little Giant in honor of the original Vesco race car, did make a run Wednesday. Driver Bob Blakely of Houston drove it 285 miles per hour. He hopes to get it up to 300 miles per hour before the meet ends.

Speed Week, sponsored by the Southern California Timing Association, continues through Friday about four miles east of Wendover. Spectator entry fees are $15 per day with dozens of motorcycles, streamliners, roadsters and other vehicles making class record runs all day.