A pair of speed-mad bikers have joined an elite group to have ridden their machines past 200mph — and are now going full throttle for potential world records.

Barry Beadle and Ben Szucs, who run Eagle Motorcycle Services, in Church Green, Witney, clocked up a combined speed of 404.8mph on their street-legal bikes in two runs on airfield runways.

Their modified Suzuki Hayabusas — once claimed as the fastest production bikes in the world — could propel their owners into the record books if they can raise enough money for a trip to the Bonneville Salt Flats, in the US state of Utah, where many land speed records have been set.

Hayabusa is the Japanese name for the peregrine falcon, a bird capable of flying at more than 200mph.

Mr Szucs said: "I'm confident with the necessary upgrades that I can produce Hayabusas capable of exceeding 250mph at Bonneville."

Mr Beadle, 47, said: "There are a couple of world records for bikes like ours and I think they stand at 233mph and 244mph. Gaining sponsorship is now a priority. I'm confident that we can break world records if we can raise the funds to ride at the salt flats."

Mr Beadle, the former landlord of the Hollybush pub in Witney, made a 201.97mph run on his turbocharged bike last month at RAF Elvington in Yorkshire, the scene of Top Gear TV presenter Richard Hammond's crash in a jet-powered car two years ago.

Mr Beadle said: "It felt like warp factor. You're covering the length of a football field every second. I'm a big adrenaline junkie and it was just such a big rush, but in safe surroundings. We had a run-off area and the runway is a mile-and-a-half long.

"I didn't look at the speedometer, I was just con- centrating on the runway ahead.

"I wasn't thinking about Hammond's accident — you have to be completely focused, and he was in a totally different situation."

He added: "At that speed, a wind that doesn't feel like much when you're standing still can cause real problems.

"However, we have set the chassis up so it's very, very stable and it actually felt like it was running on rails."

Mr Beadle's bike cost a total of £22,000 to buy and modify, and develops 329bhp from its 1,300cc engine.

He said: "We have now geared my bike up to do 219mph and will be going back to Elvington next month. The turbo on it could produce 480bhp but it would just destroy the engine.

"We went for a 200mph run last September at Woodbridge airfield, near Ipswich, but we weren't using race fuel and we blew the engine, so that required a £3,500 rebuild."

Mr Szucs, 44, reached 202.9mph on his Hayabusa at Woodbridge earlier this month. He said: "It felt very fast, and quite an achievement. It's so difficult to get up to 200mph due to the drag."

He added: "The problem with British airfields is they're only two miles long. At Bonneville you get five miles to accelerate and three miles to stop."