At this point, you might be forgiven for thinking that Tesla’s Model S has run out of things to race against. Over the past few months, we’ve seen a Tesla race a Boeing 737 down a runway, a Model S take on a motorcycle (it wasn’t even close) and even a Model S race (and get smoked by) a McLaren 650S.
But seemingly every week, a new Tesla race video emerges, and like Pavlolv’s dog, we can’t help but watch again and again. The latest installment of a Tesla Model S being put to the test comes to us courtesy of Archie Hamilton Racing who recently decided to pit the fastest Tesla available — a Model S P90D in Ludicrous Mode — against the fastest electric car on the planet, a Concept_One car from Rimac.
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For those unfamiliar, the Concept_One is a high performance electric car that is often referred to as the world’s first electric supercar. With a pricetag of close to $1 million, the Concept_One can go from 0-60 MPH in 2.6 seconds flat and has a top speed of 190 MPH. A 2016 version of the Concept_One, meanwhile, has a top speed of 220 MPH. For good measure, the folks at Archie Hamilton Racing also decided to expand the racing field by including a LaFerrari supercar.
The race was set up as a quarter mile drag race and here’s how it all went down. If you’re a Tesla enthusiast, this video will have you feeling all kinds of jealous.
Detailing the race a bit, Rimac notes on its website what makes the Concept One so unique:
While other electric cars have great performance off the line, they quickly loose their breath as speed increases. Also, most other electric cars tend to overheat after a couple of hard acceleration runs. We have three “secret weapons” to battle the Achilles’ heels of electric cars when it comes to performance. Just between you and me, I’ll whisper a bit about those secrets:
1. Tons of power and torque.
With four motors outputting 1.600 Nm at almost 0 speed and well over 1.000 hp, the Concept_One has enough torque and power to keep its tires busy even at high speeds.2. Cooling.
The Concept_One has seven independent cooling systems and several smaller sub-systems. We have worked really hard to maximize the performance for track use and not just for a couple of acceleration runs.3. Gearbox.
Each of the four motors is connected to an independent gearbox. While the front motors have single-ratio reduction gearboxes, each rear motor has its own two-speed dual-carbon-clutch gearbox. This helps us to have great acceleration while also having a very high top speed. Most importantly, it allows the Concept_One to accelerate very quickly even at high speeds.
To put it mildly, we’ve never seen a Tesla look so inadequate.
