To further optimize the Streak Eagle's weight for each flight, the plane was only loaded with as much fuel as it needed to make each record attempt. For takeoff, the plane was taxied to the end of the runway at Grand Forks and hooked up to a hold-back bar, as can be seen in the video. The pilot then throttled the engines to full afterburner, and at the precise moment, the bar was released, and the Streak Eagle launched. Even given the lightness of the airframe and the power of the engine, it's still remarkable to see how quickly the Eagle would lift off the runway after an incredibly short takeoff roll of about 400 feet. Between January 16 and February 1, Majors Smith, MacFarlane and Peterson would make good on their orders to re-write the time-to-climb record book eight times over. Among the highlights from the video:

The Streak Eagle knocked off five records in three flights in the span of six hours on the first day, January 16.

The second flight on that day broke three records: 6,000m, 9,000m and 12,000m.

The third flight reached 15,000m (just under 50,000 feet) in one minute, 17.2 seconds, which was a faster time to that height than the Saturn V rocket from the Apollo program.

On the final flight, to 30,000m (just over 98,000 feet) on February 1, Major Roger Smith pushed the Streak Eagle over the top at a maximum of just over 102,300 feet, in what the video calls a "nearly ballistic trajectory."

Anytime you can use the words "ballistic trajectory" when flying a fighter plane, you're doing something awesome. The film above is in two parts in the embedded playlist, and shows each of the six record attempts in real time, which is quite amazing to watch in itself. And the music is so 1970s.

Streak Eagle's records would not stand forever. Some eleven years later, the Sukhoi P-42 - a prototype of the Su-27 'Flanker' with a thrust-to-weight ratio of nearly 2:1 - would systematically erase the Streak Eagle's marks. You can see a short video of that here. The Streak Eagle, now with a fresh coat of paint to cover its previously unkempt hide, sits quietly in storage today at the National Museum of the United States Air Force in Dayton, Ohio. But over those two weeks in early 1975, the Streak Eagle laid claim to one of the most phenomenal record-breaking sprees for one airplane in history.