needforspeed

For some reason I bought EVO magazine for the 2nd time ever today.

They do a 'top gear' type lap test for cars they review. I hadn't noticed before, but their reference circuit is the West Circuit at Bedford Autodrome.

Funnily enough I was there recently on a corporate trackday - so I was really interested in the magazines test times:



I got to drive 2 cars on the west circuit - the Palmer Jaguar JP1:

http://www.palmersport.com/cars_jaguar.htm

and the Formula Palmer Audi:

http://www.palmersport.com/cars_audi.htm

Given that many of us mere mortals have never driven anything like a lamborghini gallardo or ferrari F430 (and probably never will) I always wondered what driving a car that fast would feel like.

Well interestingly my fairly poor time in the JP1 was 83 secs - as fast as the Mosler. The best driver on the day managed 79.3 - faster than the quickest time posted by EVO.

They don't time the FPA, but at the end of the day you get a 'trace' against a time posted by an FPA driver (Justin Wilson).

Most people managed times of around 82 secs (mine was a lot worse but I had some slower drivers in the way - honest) - that's faster than the Gallardo. I think the fastest time on the day was also around 79 secs and from memory Justin Wilsons time was way lower - 70 secs or so !

This doesn't mean an awful lot probably, but for me it's puts into perspective the relative performance of these supercars - I have a benchmark from which to judge them.

The FPA and JP1 felt incredibly quick - interesting that they would clearly destroy the worlds greatest supercars as well - at least on this track.

BetterMakeWay

WOW man! I kinda envy you...in a good way that is . Really! Congrats on the unique experience. I sure would have liked to make a test like that.
Also about the lap times...is that really the difference between the M6 lap time and the E60 M5?! Even the M3 CS being faster than the M5? Is that an E60 m5? Hell the 330i is 5 hundreds of a second slower. I hardly can bealive that's the E60 and not the E39. glad that the porsche has a top spot even though i bealive it's the 996 GT3 RS version since the new one didn't come out yet. Also no 997 GT3 lap time. Those porsches are fast.

needforspeed

I think it's the e39 M5 the e60 M5 would definitely be faster than the maserati quattroporte - and yes not the VERY latest GT3 RS.

They also lapped the following in this months magazine:

Carrera GT - 1.19.70
Ariel Atom 300 Supercharged - 1.21.85
Caterham CSR Superlight - 1.21.85
Koenigsegg CCX - 1.22.30 secs
997 Turbo - 1.23.55
EVO IX FQ - 340 - 1.24.55

Pretty amaxing that this thing is faster than the carrera GT:

http://www.channel4.com/4car/feature/motor...n/caterham.html

BetterMakeWay

Yup impressive for a caterham but still far from a track car for my tastes. I would choose the CGT any time and day. I'm in love with the CGT and it's my favorite car in the whole world. Other cars are faster of course but not that many and that's not the most important factor for me, there are others to consider as well. Hell those catherhams looks sooo fugly. The atom looks way better. The carrera GT is a fully usable car when those are only for...well very limited usage. Helmet is a must in those cars otherwise probably you'll have to have a couple hundreds spare sun glasses and the mouth perfectly shut so that no bees trouble you .... it reminded me of the TopGear test with the atom.

needforspeed

We drove caterhams on the track day as well - but on another, more twisty circuit.

Great fun - but they bite - I span 3 times.

Not as souped up as the one that tops this table though:

http://www.palmersport.com/cars_caterham.htm

You're right though the CGT is the faster 'proper car'

Simple1

I fully concur with everything stated here we have the same taste in automobiles

BetterMakeWay

Yup...anyway an unique experience as i said.
So it's hard to keep them neat and tidy? How hard it is to recover it once the traction is lost to the rear wheels? And do you know if you can do progressive and continued power slides? LSD?

BetterMakeWay

Yeeeey another CGT freak....

0700700

its the e60 m5 nfs... you should know better... look in the end for a pros and cons of the maserati quattroporte, they say its quicker than the m6. also look at the june issue where they retest the two cars and the quattroporte is still quicker

needforspeed

I've only bought evo twice! The last one I bought had this article in it:

http://www.evo.co.uk/cargrouptests/cargrou...e_outsider.html

From memory - I thought the M5 was faster than the massa around the bedford circuit. If it wasn't and the posted time is for the e60 M5 then my first though is that the 330i (my next car) did VERY well indeed to get so close to the M.

The other thing that made me think this was the e39 M5 was that the M3 was quicker. When Top Gear lapped the cars the M5 was much faster than the M3.