The quietest drag race ever - Turbo S vs. Plaid vs. Lucid

[Tay Tay]

I skipped all the blah blah blah talking for you....

 

[Mike in CA]

Not saying this would have made a big difference but there was something off with the Turbo S.

Car&Driver tested the Turbo S 0-60 in 2.4 and the 1/4 mile in 10.5 @ 130mph. Motor Trend got almost identical numbers. I applied a stopwatch multiple times to the in-car video of the Porsche at the 5:30 mark and based on the speedometer readout I get around 3.7 seconds to 60. There's no 1/4 mile marker and because the steering wheel rim briefly obscures the speedo readout at a crucial time it's hard to be precise, but it appears to take around 11.5 seconds to get to 127mph. The driver also let off the accelerator completely shortly after reaching that speed.

Like I said, none of this explains the result (the extra 250+ HP of the Tesla and Lucid already does that) but that Porsche/driver combo wasn't quite right.

 

[Draman]

To a degree, I feel like Porsche picked the power levels based on an ICE world. It takes a lot of design and engineering to make a 600+ hp ICE engine, but it takes very little (comparatively) to do so with electric. That's why relatively mundane car manufacturers like Kia are coming out with nearly 600 hp family crossovers. IMO Porsche basically powered the Taycan like it was still competing against ICE cars. The Turbo should be 800ish hp and the Turbo S should be 1000ish so they can be the rocket ships that they were designed to be relative to other electric vehicles (not that they aren't rocket ships in general). As is, I wouldn't be surprised to see random trucks or crossovers or what have you that will end up beating even a Turbo S (in a straight line)

 

[WattTurbo]

Not saying this would have made a big difference but there was something off with the Turbo S.

Car&Driver tested the Turbo S 0-60 in 2.4 and the 1/4 mile in 10.5 @ 130mph. Motor Trend got almost identical numbers. I applied a stopwatch multiple times to the in-car video of the Porsche at the 5:30 mark and based on the speedometer readout I get around 3.7 seconds to 60. There's no 1/4 mile marker and because the steering wheel rim briefly obscures the speedo readout at a crucial time it's hard to be precise, but it appears to take around 11.5 seconds to get to 127mph. The driver also let off the accelerator completely shortly after reaching that speed.

Like I said, none of this explains the result (the extra 250+ HP of the Tesla and Lucid already does that) but that Porsche/driver combo wasn't quite right.

If you watch his other videos you’ll see that your observation is correct. He tested that TTS by itself using Draggy and it was slower than a typical TTS. I noticed it too when I watched it last week.

 

[timo]

A low 10 second will get crushed by a low 9 second car every time. If you're trying to justify the spanking please stop. We all know the Taycan is no match for the Plaid or Lucid in a drag race. We purchased the Taycan for different reasons.

I just came out of a mid 10 second CTS-V. I'm a petrol head, horsepower junkie etc. Even that amount of power is way overboard for the street. Enjoy our cars for what they are.

 

[nickmdp]

A low 10 second will get crushed by a low 9 second car every time. If you're trying to justify the spanking please stop. We all know the Taycan is no match for the Plaid or Lucid in a drag race. We purchased the Taycan for different reasons.

I just came out of a mid 10 second CTS-V. I'm a petrol head, horsepower junkie etc. Even that amount of power is way overboard for the street. Enjoy our cars for what they are.

Seriously, I don't think I could trust myself with anything under 3 second 0-60. It's just such a crazy amount of power. If the GTS wasn't the only way to get the Sport Turismo body in the US, the 4S would have be plenty for me to handle.

That said, with all those cars lined up like that, there's not one bit of doubt in my mind that the Taycan is far and away the best looking of the group.

 

[Mike in CA]

A low 10 second will get crushed by a low 9 second car every time. If you're trying to justify the spanking please stop. We all know the Taycan is no match for the Plaid or Lucid in a drag race. We purchased the Taycan for different reasons.

I just came out of a mid 10 second CTS-V. I'm a petrol head, horsepower junkie etc. Even that amount of power is way overboard for the street. Enjoy our cars for what they are.

Respectfully, you've misunderstood my point. I'm not trying to justify anything. If you re-read my post, you'll note I stated (twice) that the timing issue I described does not explain the beat down nor would it have made a difference in the end result. Still the fact remains that the Turbo S in the video, by the stopwatch, is significantly slower than a typical Turbo S, so much so that I double checked to make sure they hadn't slipped in a 4S.

 

[WuffvonTrips]

To a degree, I feel like Porsche picked the power levels based on an ICE world...
...IMO Porsche basically powered the Taycan like it was still competing against ICE cars.

I agree, and the key competitor for Porsche EVs is Porsche ICEs. Until the 911 goes EV (with or without a new name) I don't think other Porsche EVs- even as upcoming 2-seaters- will be allowed to eclipse its straight-line performance.

 

[jasperp]

Two things come to my mind:
1. This is caused by a property of Porsche I really don't like:
marketing is far more important to Porsche than technical excellence.
The Taycan was not allowed to be faster than the 911. Engineers could easily make the Taycan way faster, but the marketing departement did not want to hurt the 911 image.
It is the same reason why they played with the power levels of the RWD , the performance battery+ and the silly launch control feature. Just marketing to fool the customer.
(To me this is the most annoying property of Porsche: I have the feeling they always try to trick me as a customer. I did not have that feeling with a Tesla.)

2. This proves also that the 911 will be electric. And it will be electric much sooner than most people expect. A ICE 911 will not be able to compete. More and more high performance EV's will come on the market, and the ICE 911 will look bad compared to those.

 

[ptilley42]

and a real race on twisty roads ?. Wouldn't that be a real comparison and who really uses launch control in the real world apart from a one off novelty factor.

 

[PorscheCH]

and a real race on twisty roads ?. Wouldn't that be a real comparison and who really uses launch control in the real world apart from a one off novelty factor.

I agree. Some cars happen to have fascinating performances beyond straight lines. Put a plaid (or a Lucid?) in a hillclimb competition of sort and their brakes and suspensions will work wonders, maybe...

A more than good driver did 7:30:9 at Nordschleife with a stock plaid (though brakes look totally different but they say it's "stock" ?), 1000 hp to do what a Panamera turbo did two years before with half hp or similar to a Giulia quadrifoglio 5 years prior (also half the power).

 

[Sidicks]

Two things come to my mind:
1. This is caused by a property of Porsche I really don't like:
marketing is far more important to Porsche than technical excellence.
The Taycan was not allowed to be faster than the 911. Engineers could easily make the Taycan way faster, but the marketing departement did not want to hurt the 911 image.
It is the same reason why they played with the power levels of the RWD , the performance battery+ and the silly launch control feature. Just marketing to fool the customer.
(To me this is the most annoying property of Porsche: I have the feeling they always try to trick me as a customer. I did not have that feeling with a Tesla.)

2. This proves also that the 911 will be electric. And it will be electric much sooner than most people expect. A ICE 911 will not be able to compete. More and more high performance EV's will come on the market, and the ICE 911 will look bad compared to those.

I think you’re missing the whole ethos of Porsche - just as they’ve not chased headline bhp figures generally, and particularly for the recent GT4, RS, GT3 etc, ownership of these cars is about much more than 0-60mph times. You only have to see how frequently the 911 outperforms cars with much higher power figures, on track, due to its weight management and handling.

Of course the 911 will have an electric option at some point (maybe a hybrid first), but straight line performance is a long way down the priority list for Porsche (and for most owners).

 

[jontybutts]

(To me this is the most annoying property of Porsche: I have the feeling they always try to trick me as a customer. I did not have that feeling with a Tesla.)

I have the opposite opinion, Tesla always over promise and underdeliver

 

[nickmdp]

I have the opposite opinion, Tesla always over promise and underdeliver

I agree, you can certainly give Porsche crap for how they handle all the various trim levels and the dozens of options available to try and get people to upsell themselves, but at no point have I felt like they were trying to deceive me. When one company needs to put their car in extremely specific scenarios that aren't what anyone would call real world in order to replicate the 0-60 times they publish (and are still arguably inaccurate), and the other company regularly has cars beating their marketing numbers significantly on normal streets, I feel like it's pretty clear who's the more deceiving company.

 

[Mike in CA]

To me this is the most annoying property of Porsche: I have the feeling they always try to trick me as a customer. I did not have that feeling with a Tesla.

Really? Maybe you aren't familiar with Tesla's false promises regarding the several times delayed CyberTruck, how they took $50K deposits on the now vaporware Roadster, and their repeatedly hyped and mislabeled "Autopilot" and "Full Self Driving" capabilities, to name a few.

Tesla has done some good stuff, but Elon Musk is the closest thing the auto industry has to a P.T. Barnum.