So it’s official. A Formula 1 car is faster than a V8 Supercar and a superbike. A lot faster.
In the ultimate race of the fastest machines on four and two wheels, the Formula 1 car, driven by Aussie ace Mark Webber, destroyed the V8 and bike in a head-to-head battle at Sydney Motorsport Park over the weekend.
Webber lapped both the bike and V8 Supercar after just three laps of Sydney Motorsport Park’s short circuit.
The V8, driven by four-time champ Jamie Whincup and the bike, ridden by MotoGP world champ Casey Stoner, enjoyed a race long battle before the V8 Supercar took a narrow second place.
Aussie F1 ace Mark Webber has obliterated the existing lap record at Sydney Motorsport Park, lowering the mark of 1:19.1420 set by Nico Hulkenberg in 2007 by almost four seconds.
Webber best time of 1:15.2180 came on the last of his five scheduled laps around the original Eastern Creek Grand Prix circuit. But while taking four second off the record was impressive, it was a case of ‘what-could-have-been’ with Red Bull confirming to Auto Action that Webber’s Red Bull RB7 had been detuned for the record-breaking run.
“It’s a demo car so we’re not allowed to run the proper Pirelli tyres on it,” said a team spokesperson. “It’s not anywhere near its prime. We have to turn the engine [mapping] down but it’ll still reach a top of around 290km/h.”
Webber completed five flying laps of Sydney Motorsport Park, lowering the existing record with each successive run. The Aussie then thrilled the large crowd at SMP with a spectacular burnout in his Red Bull racer.
The winners have been announced in the Wheels/Holden EFIJY competition.
The six lucky winners, listed below, will get to experience the ultra-rare EFIJY concept and new VF Commodore SS V first-hand this weekend as part of the Top Gear Festival in Sydney.
Congratulations!
Saturday winners:
Paul Bolt
Michelle Thornton
Leanne Hines
Sunday winners:
Jillian Rickard
Hamish Milburn
Ann Maree Wheatley
One of the most outrageous super performance cars to debut at this year’s Geneva Motor Show is barely a car at all.
A new GT version of KTM’s radical X-Bow features a full windscreen to partially civilise one of the rawest driving experiences available in a road registerable car.
Powered by a 210kW/420Nm four cylinder engine, the skeletal X-Bow weighs just 847kg, for a staggering power-to-weight ratio of 248kW/tonne.
The rear-wheel drive road racer is fitted with an old-school, six-speed manual gearbox for ultimate purity and maximum enjopyment.
Picture this: you’re driving to work and traffic is the usual peak hour crawl.
So, you engage autopilot and turn your attention to other matters, like making calls, answering emails, organising your day. The car not only advances and stops with the traffic, it also steers itself, making turns at intersections, delivering you to your office.
You get out, grab your briefcase and, via a smartphone app, tell the car to park itself. The car disappears around the corner into the parking garage, heads up to the appropriate level, locates an empty slot and parks itself.
After work, you walk out the front door and, again via the smartphone, tell the car to return. A minute later your car arrives, and opens the door, ready for you to begin the journey home.
This fictional scenario could be reality in the next two years, Audi development boss Dr Wolfgang Durheimer told Wheels at the Geneva show. It is practically production-ready, he said.
“Piloted Drive and valet park is now. Technically we know how to do it, and we have the technology and the systems under control. It could be in production from 2015 on. To hand over to the car in stop-and-go traffic… we are there. We know how to do it.”
When asked what car it could appear on first, Dr Durheimer had no hesitation in naming Audi’s luxury flagship, the A8 sedan. He said real-world testing of Piloted Drive is already happening in America.
“In Nevada we have the legal approval from the state that we can do test drives on the road without any interruption.”
Dr Durheimer says early versions of Piloted Drive will be far from the much-publicised scenario of reading the newspaper in the back seat while the car chauffeurs you to work.
He says it will more closely mirror autopilot on a plane.
“Piloted Drive is a very good name for this. An aeroplane pilot is always alert. He doesn’t sleep. He is watching the controls, he is looking outside the windows. He is ready to take over as soon as the system says he needs to.
“[So] you cannot sit in the back seat. And as soon as you disappear from the driver’s position we will stop the car, activate the emergency brake, the hazards will start to blink and the car will pull aside and not drive anymore.”
He says the system initially will not operate at higher freeway speeds.
“No, not for our autonomous drive by 2015. I’m talking about traffic jams and boring traffic situations that waste time and are easy to control.”
But it will come, eventually.
“Of course there will be a challenge between carmakers who can do the highest speed fully autonomous. But I wouldn’t compete in this race. I much rather prefer to race at Le Mans. But it’s human that people try out these situations.
“I think the sanctioning body, the governments will not allow autonomous driving above a certain speed. I think the traffic jam situation and the stop and go situation in the morning will be our limits, at least in the near future.”
As for when this system could come to Australia, Dr Durheimer is circumspect. “It’s all a matter of regulatory environments.”
As for the valet parking scenario, “in this specific case it’s necessary that the garage has the infrastructure to support it,” says Dr Durheimer. Which won’t happen until there are enough autopilot cars to warrant it.
Audi wants a supercar to tackle Ferrari, Lamborghini, Porsche and McLaren for supercar bragging rights.
Talking to Wheels magazine at the Geneva Auto Salon, Audi boardmember and development chief Dr Wolfgang Durheimer outlined the brand’s dreams to build a “street legal Le Mans car”.
Audi has won the world’s premiere endurance event an incredible 11 times in the last 13 years, a domination it is keen to turn into dollars. And it’s not interested in coming second on the road either.
“I think if we do an ‘R’ e-tron quattro from the Le Mans car we could compete with these cars,” he said. “It would be a derivative of the R18 e-tron quattro that did the 2012 victory in Le Mans, as a street-legal car, with hybrid, high-tech, extremely fast, diesel-driven race engine, limited volume.”
Dr Durheimer said environmental sustainability would play an important role if such a car were to reach production — ironic given he was largely responsible for cancelling Audi’s R8 e-tron electric supercar project.
“I think we will have passion, emotions and high performance also in our mind in 10 years from now and 100 years from now, because it is human sport to find out who is the fastest … we need to do this in a sustainable way, not to waste energy, but also to save energy and think about the next generation that comes [after] us to find a world still in good condition.
“But,” he said, “we will not stop racing and we will not stop finding out who is the fastest 0-100.”
Dr Durheimer wouldn’t be drawn on the car’s potential name, except to say it would have close ties to the racing car.
“If the Le Mans car for street-legal use comes it would not be an R8 or R9. R8 is a platform in the model line and the race car doesn’t have anything to do with it. It would be derived from the race car.”
“It’s looking cool, it’s high performance, it’s the thing for car aficionados and this will not change in the future,” he said.
Click HERE to launch gallery.
Famous automotive design specialist Italdesign Giugiaro, has celebrated its 45th anniversary by unveiling a unique, mid-engine, two-seat, all-wheel drive sport utility GT at the Geneva motor show, based on the Lamborghini Gallardo sports car.
Called ‘Parcour’, to reflect the dynamism and agility used in that athletic, outdoor discipline, the car is powered by the donor Lambo’s 419kW/540Nm 5.2-litre, V10 engine, and is claimed to sprint from 0-100km/h in 3.6sec.
Built in Hardtop and Roadster versions, the Parcour’s suspension is a push-rod design, as used in the majority of open-wheel formula racing cars, and features two coilover spring/damper units per wheel.
The driver can choose between four, electronically-controlled suspension settings – comfort, off-road, winter and high-speed.
Not since the Chrysler by Chrysler of the 1970s has a brand offered such a stupid name as the Ferrari LaFerrari.
Still it’s hard to be too critical of the star of the Geneva motor show. Ferrari’s new flagship is billed as an F1 car for the road with technology transfer in the carbon tub and hybrid drivetrain.
The mid-mounted 6.3-litre V12 is related to that used in the FF and F12 but now makes 588kW and is redlined at a screaming 9250rpm. An electric motor adds a further 120kW.
After an almost endless stream of teaser images in the lead up to this week’s Geneva Motor Show, Rolls-Royce has officially pulled the wraps of its new Wraith, four-seat, fastback coupe.
To use a classic Rolls-Royce phrase, power is ‘adequate”, thanks to a monstrous 465kW/800Nm V12 under the bonnet, feeding drive to the rear wheels via ZF 8-speed auto transmission.
After an almost endless stream of teaser images in the lead up to this week’s Geneva Motor Show, Rolls-Royce has officially pulled the wraps of its new Wraith, four-seat, fastback coupe.
To use a classic Rolls-Royce phrase, power is ‘adequate”, thanks to a monstrous 465kW/800Nm V12 under the bonnet, feeding drive to the rear wheels via ZF 8-speed auto transmission.
The Wraith features retuned steering and a stiffer suspension than its four-door Ghost sibling, for a more driver-focussed experience.
Forward opening ‘suicide’ doors reveal a suitably opulent interior, including the (optional) Starlight headlining that debuted on the Phantom limousine.
