The Goodwood Pageant of Velocity occurred this weekend, and Ford’s electrical SuperVan managed to beat each different automobile, fuel or electrical, to the highest of the hill.
The Goodwood Pageant of Velocity is a yearly occasion on the grounds of Goodwood Home, a historic property in West Sussex, England. The occasion began in 1993, and has grow to be one of many largest motorsports festivals on the planet.
Many firms attend Goodwood to debut new fashions, and fanatics or race groups will exhibit uncommon or custom-made autos or race distinctive automobiles.
One of many central options of the occasion is the Goodwood hillclimb, a brief one-way race up a small hill on the property. The observe is just one.17mi/1.89km lengthy, with a 304ft/92.7m uphill climb. It’s not a very taxing occasion – merely a enjoyable method to exhibit some basic or distinctive racing autos.
This 12 months, a number of EVs debuted at Goodwood, together with these beforehand lined on Electrek:
Many of those autos take part within the hillclimb, although some do it solely in an illustration capability – they’re not making an attempt for the most effective time, simply displaying off in entrance of the gang.
However different autos be a part of the “shootout,” the race occasion for bragging rights, making an attempt to get the highest time to the highest of the hill.
For 20 years, the document was held by a 1998 V10 F1 automotive piloted by Nick Heidfeld. That document was damaged in 2019 by Romain Dumas driving VW’s ID.R electrical racecar, after which in 2022, the present 39.08 second document was set by Max Chilton within the McMurtry Spierling “fan automotive,” an electrical automotive which makes use of an enormous fan underneath the automotive to create unfavourable stress for extra downforce to assist acceleration and cornering.
This 12 months, no one was actually going for the document, however the massive contest was between two autos: Subaru’s “Undertaking Midnight,” a closely modified WRX with a 670hp flat-four ICE engine piloted by Scott Velocity; and Ford’s SuperVan, an E-Transit-in-name-only that has been rebuilt as a 1,400hp racecar and was piloted by former recordholder Romain Dumas.
In qualifying, the 2 autos had been neck and neck, with the SuperVan pipping the Subaru by a tenth of a second – 45.0 to 45.1. However it might be all the way down to the wire on the Sunday Shootout.
And when the outcomes got here in on Sunday, the SuperVan smashed the WRX – with a time of 43.98 seconds, in comparison with the ICE Subaru’s 46.07.
Right here’s the video, queued up for the SuperVan (if you wish to watch earlier runs, scroll again – the SuperVan is the final one – and the official timing reveals a bit of totally different than what’s proven on the printed):
This isn’t the primary spectacular displaying from the SuperVan. Ford shattered observe information at Bathurst in it, and took it to Pike’s Peak final 12 months as effectively and had a powerful displaying. This 12 months, Ford despatched a distinct automobile to Pike’s Peak, the SuperTruck, which set the quickest time of the day however didn’t set a document (and certainly was slower than the SuperVan’s earlier effort – because the SuperTruck had an sudden shutdown partway up the hill this 12 months).
And all of that is notably attention-grabbing as a result of race automobiles aren’t speculated to be big vans. Sustaining low weight is a vital facet for a racecar, because the extra you weigh, the more durable it’s to speed up, brake and switch. So this honking beast’s efficiency is sort of spectacular – although we predict we’d reasonably have one thing a bit of smaller for regular racing functions.
Another piece of EV information from this 12 months’s Goodwood – Lotus introduced its one-off, multi-million-dollar Evija X, which it used to set an insane 6:24.047 laptime at Nurburgring earlier this 12 months, and managed to crash it instantly after the beginning line as its 1,704Nm of torque turned unmanageable from a standing begin. So we’ll have to attend to see what time it’d set… presumably with traction management activated subsequent time.
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