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Tesla Model S Plaid sets the production EV 'Ring record at 7:35.579:
Tesla's new tri-motor technological terror -- the Model S Plaid -- finally got its day at Germany's famed and feared Nurburgring Nordschleife. It managed to set the official production electric vehicle record while it was there -- even with that goofy steering yoke.
Elon Musk announced the record on his Twitter account on Thursday, and while the sheet of paper he posted shows two times, the official time that Nurburgring officials count is the slower of the two at 7:35.579, rather than 7:30.909.
Tesla posted a video of the run on Friday, and the Nurburgring posted the same video, but with onscreen telemetry. While neither of them looks (or sounds) very fast, that's kind of the reality of modern cars, especially modern electric cars.
Watch it on YouTube
(I count myself fortunate to have driven a lap around the Grand Prix section of the Nürburgring in September 1997 when I was working on a project for FIA. Fun times! --martyb).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 13 2021, @02:18PM (2 children)
It appears this wasn't a factory trim of the Model S Plaid, which I suppose doesn't matter much except it means that the car that set the record is not the same thing as the car someone rich and stupid enough to buy a Model S Plaid from the showroom gets. https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a29089178/tesla-porsche-nurburgring-ev-record/ [caranddriver.com]
A few years ago the electric Porsche Taycan did way better than the 2016 Model S P85D in Car and Driver's lap testing because the Model S went into "overheated" mode quickly. https://www.caranddriver.com/features/g35279855/lightning-lap-2021-times-every-car-every-time/ [caranddriver.com] (it's a big page, search for Taycan or Tesla to see the relevant bits)
I don't know why I care, even if I had that kind of money I have better things to do with it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 14 2021, @01:47AM (1 child)
If you read Car and Driver a lot, you are probably already familiar with Tesla cheating to get their numbers. My favorite is their 0-60 time that isn't a real measure of the time it takes for them to go 0-60 and was done on surface treatment instead of track. It was so obvious they weren't sub 2 seconds but they couldn't help but try to sneak it by everyone.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 14 2021, @06:46PM
Car and Driver itself cheated its way to the forefront of auto enthusiast magazines by implementing a policy that 0-60 mph times start getting recorded after the car moves forward one foot. Since traction from a dead stop is a serious problem for cars with lots of power, that artificially reduced C&Ds 0-60 mph and standing quarter mile times compared to all other magazines. So when the Corvette, Mustang, and M3 enthusiasts were screaming at each other about performance they would use C&D to get their figures.
But no, I didn't know Tesla cheated. Thanks for the info.