The NSX race car also drops the hybrid powertrain doesn’t it? At this point, isn’t it pretty much a silhouette racer*?

Went to Urban Dictionary.

Can’t. Unsee.

Best of all, you won't have to worry about dying of starvation or radioactive fallout because if the engine doesn't catch fire and burn you to ash then the snap oversteer will send you off the side of a mountain road and into a ravine.

That’s a “Garage 56" entry. I *think* this is the 2014 grid, which would make that the Nissan ZEOD RC—which did a full lap of the circuit on electric power only but suffered a gearbox failure and didn’t end up finishing the full 24 hours.

Nonono, you’re confused. Black, white and red are Porsche’s colors. How ludicrous would it be if two or more teams used the same color scheme on a grid?

Super excited that at least a few examples thing will actually be racing, unlike the New Stratos, of which every one of the 25 copies will be spending their days in a climate controlled garage...

When they say that it can store ‘10 times the power’, I think they are trying to convey this idea of how fast the energy can be deployed.

Listen—I’ve given up on the fact that batteries are rated in terms of “milliamp-hours,” even though discharge voltages are rarely constant or consistent. But a battery that’s “ten times more powerful” is very different from a battery with “ten times the capacity.” To wit—supercapacitors are really good at quickly…

store “10 times the power”

I’m not sure how much that has to do with power and how much it has to do with gearing and the characteristics of the car. While it’s true that at very high speeds, drag becomes enough of a factor that it takes significant power to maintain your speed, you only need about 15 horsepower to stay at 60 mph, plugging in…

No, but energy = power x time — lower power means your energy store lasts longer.

That’s fascinating! I was totally misinformed!

Oh wow! Today I learned!

Regarding the power rating: as you of course know, the iconic “2CV” is an abbreviation of “deux chevaux,” meaning that the car was originally advertised at 2 horsepower (though it looks like it actually had closer to 10?). There is no concrete reason that modern cars need 100+HP except that people want to pass the guy…

I’m still pissed they retired that set a year early (based on how long the sets typically stick around). It’s not like it was a slow seller--it typically sold out in the brand stores I frequented before any of the other cars in the line. Oh well--at least I got enough while they were in stores to build an orange one,…

More on the Michelins: Autocar reported that each tire used for the run was X-rayed to make sure none of the radial bands touched—not something that’s a problem at 200mph, but could have been catastrophic at 300: https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/new-cars/bugatti-chiron-goes-304mph-set-hypercar-record

Interesting. I’d heard from others that it had abysmal range even by California EV Special standards and that the kicker was that it was pretty joyless to drive. But if that's not true then I'm just devastated we didn't get them in the rest of the country.

On the one hand, I love these cars. I think they’re quirky and beautiful and the exhaust on the Abarths sounds like angels Tongan throat-singing.

I think this is at least partially a generational thing, or, at the very least, a YMMV. The best races to me are the clean ones where everyone finishes, and the races are decided based on who shows the best skill in the best car running the best strategy with the fewest mistakes. A driver overcooking their braking…