Jim Rockford

Teslas handily trounce supercars in drag races. SUVs can keep similar track times with top tier sportscars. The lines are blurred. Given I am not being paid to turn laptimes it doesn’t bother me a bit if a Cayenne is nipping at my heels at VIR. I know what vehicle will reward me more in ownership for my use case.

Zhao

How many laps can that Cayenne do? The problem with hot lap tests is a lot of cars can only do one lap before they're toast but tehy only need one lap to look good for these videos. Turbo heat soak, brakes cooked, tires cooked, tranny overheating, everything on fire, etc. Remember Randy basically ran what would have worked out to identical times if they were on the same tires in a 718 Cayman S vs a 981 GT4, but not mentioned was the cayman S would not be able to continue to do that lap time all day while the 981 GT4 could.

The same goes for EVs. They're very fast for a bit, but then they're not because they get hot and they get slower if not on a full charge.

Cpt Voodoo

VIR has a lot of long straights where the Cayenne's extra power really makes a difference.

F1-DNA

2020 Porsche 718 Cayman GT4, 2:50.3
2015 Porsche 911 GT3, 2:50.4

This still crazy to me that the 718 GT4 is practically the same lap-time as a 991.1 GT3… This is manual vs PDK too!

enduro

Yep. On the street this won't matter much; if you run 30 min sessions, at a minimum the SUV's gonna run into tire issues, meanwhile the GT4's going to be in its element. And for the EVs, it's gonna take some ultra wizard tires to handle 30 mins from a 5000 lb car. Different strokes.

minn19

IIRC these laps are done by different drivers (amateurs) on different days/conditions etc. Hence not a great actual comparison but entertaining nonetheless. I like it because the drivers are amateurs and it shows what a mere mortal may be able to get out of said car. Randy Pobst laps or professional ring times mean absolutely nothing to me since there is no way in hell I could come even close to those times.

Zhao

So far every EV i've instructed in has handled the tire issue by Rocket ship on the straights and turtle in the corners. THey have other problems like after 10 (15 at most) minutes the battery and motors are overheating. Then they get about 15-20 minutes of driving on track before performance falls off a cliff.

EV's are neat and it's sorta scary how fast a Telsa goes down a long straight but there is zero chance I'd buy one as a sports car anytime soon. That would be a huge mistake IMO for anyone considering taking one to the track.

TXshaggy

Head on over to the Cayenne Forum. Turbo owner destroyed his PSCBs on a 25 minute “proper hill blast”…whatever that is.

So yeah, these one lap observations are of limited value.

These 718s are not “numbers cars”…you get them for the sublime driving experience.

ipse dixit

Same could be said for any lap record, including those Porsche circle jerks' favorite 'Ring records.