The Nurburgring has long been a testing ground for a number of the world’s fastest vehicles. It seems that all of the biggest car manufacturers have taken their turns around the Nurburgring with the same goal in mind: set the fastest lap for a production car in one of the world’s most famous circuits
The latest to take a stab at the record is the new Porsche 997 GT3 RS, which took to the track last week. While the record – 6m and 48s set by the Radical SR8LM - was realistically unattainable, the GT3 RS wanted to measure itself up against cars of its caliber.
In the end, the GT3 RS posted a time of 7m and 33s, seven seconds faster than the standard GT3. The time falls way short of the SR8LM’s lap record and is also slower than the Nissan GT-R’s time of 7m 27s. The GT3 RS’s lap time is still an impressive time posted by the folks from Porsche.
When BMW decided that the next-generation M5 would cease the use of that unmistakable V10 engine and instead drop it to a twin-turbo V8, the public outcry could be heard miles and miles away.
After all, the V10 engine and the M5 have become synonymous with each other, and not being able to hear the same power come out of the M5 will definitely take some getting used to.
Recently – and amid the camouflage it came with – BMW took the new 5-Series out to the Nurburgring for some laps of testing. It’s hard to make out what the car looks like but for those who are worried that the new 5-Series would lack the bite of its V10 predecessors, we invite you to watch the video of the camouflaged 5-Series and listen to that unbridled roar from the engine. You can’t tell much of a difference, can you?
Any car enthusiast will tell you that if there’s one race circuit in the world that they’d like to burn rubber on, it’s the Nurburgring Nordschleife race track in Germany. While our chances of ever stepping into the graffiti-laden pavement of Nurburgring may have been little to none in the past, we may finally get our chance soon enough.
BMW will soon release a BMW M5 taxi exclusively for the Nurburgring. OK, so you won’t be behind the wheel of the car, but still, taking a lap of the ‘Ring in the passenger seat of an M5 is still better than anything you could have ever hoped for.
You must be warned, though. BMW Motorsports have said that tickets for the M5 Ring-Taxi are as scarce as snow in the Philippines and that availability – if there’s any – will be announced by BMW around Christmas-time.
Nevertheless, it’s still worth keeping tabs on. After all, you don’t get many opportunities like this in your lifetime, and if you can do it, we guarantee you’ll become the envy of all your car-loving friends, for as long as you don’t tell them that you were just in the passenger seat of the M5.
Just when we thought the Lamborghini Gallardo LP560-4 Superleggera has been reduced to nothing more than a fantasy car, an actual, real-life Superleggera may have been found taking in a couple of laps at the Nurburgring by our friends over at Autogespot
Actually, we might need to rub our eyes repeatedly to know that this is indeed a Superleggera. In the event that this is indeed a Superleggera, seeing it raises a number of questions surrounding the status of this car. Where’s it been all this time? And what do expect from Lamborghini with this car down the road especially since they already decided to scrap it just a year ago?
In any case, those questions can be answered at another time. What’s important is the car looks to be back on track – in more ways than one.
If you recall, the Gallardo Superleggera was introduced just a year before the LP560-4 made the scene with the former created with a tad more horsepower than the traditional Gallardo’s but weighed considerably less, making it faster and more lightweight than any of the Gallardos roaming around the streets.
Is it us or is the McLaren P11 supercar making some sort of track-testing world tour?
Days after being spotted in Bahrain doing a few test laps, McLaren’s latest creation was again spotted doing another testing session, this time, at the Nurburgring Nordschleife circuit in Germany.
As was the case in Dubai, the P11 is still wrapped under some – and we’ll be honest – pretty hideous camouflage. Nevertheless, the car is expected to look nothing like the zebra-striped abomination we’ve been seeing for the past couple of months.
We can definitely say for sure that as soon as the covers are lifted; expect the P11 – or whatever its name is going to be – to be nothing short of spectacular.
For a lot of us who are in tune with cars, the recent news that the Gumpert Apollo Sport broke the Nurburgring lap record for a road-production car with a time of 7:11.57 caught us off-guard. It wasn’t because we didn’t think the Apollo could do it, but it was more because we knew that the ‘record time’ the folks at Gumpert claimed the Apollo did was still about 16 seconds slower than the actual world-record holder, the Radical SR8 achieved when it set a blistering time of 6:55 at the very same track.
As it turns out, the folks at Radical may have also heard of Gumpert’s proclamations and promptly set the record straight the only way they know how: shatter it again. We mentioned a couple of days ago about the new car Radical is developing that would succeed the SR8 in the record books – the SR8LM.
So in an effort to clear up the confusion, Radical let the SR8LM loose at the Nurburgring where it ran wild around the lap to break the record held by its predecessor by a staggering seven seconds, clocking in at 6:48.
Yesterday, we featured the Gumpert Apollo Sport setting a road-production car lap record at the Nurburgring with a time of 7:11.57. The time, which was set by Florian Gruber, proved that the Apollo Sport is one mean driving machine. Today, we have the a video of the ‘record-setting’ lap, courtesy of our good friends at Sport Auto.
There, of course, remains some scepticism as to whether or not the Apollo Sport did break the record especially considering that the Radical SR8, another car that falls into the category of ‘road-production vehicle’, blasted through the same track at 6:55 four years ago.
But that’s a debate for another time. We’re here to acknowledge the achievement of the folks from Gumpert. Record or not, a time of 7:11.57 by a road-production car at the extremely demanding Nurburgring Nordscheif is an accomplishment in every sense of the word.
For four years, a lot of supercars have taken the Nurburgring track in hopes of breaking the fastest lap recorded by a production car. Set by the Radical SR8 way back in 2005, its record time of 6 minutes and 55 seconds has remained untouched by all those supercars that have tried in vain to topple the SR8 from its lofty perch. While it’s beginning to look like there won’t be a road legal supercar from other carmakers that will come close to besting the SR8, Radical is looking at breaking its own record with the SR8’s successor, the SR8LM.
Just like the SR8, the SR8LM is a fully legal road car, built to the same specifications of road-legal cars with matching Dunlop Direzza road tires to boot. The car will be driven around the track by Michael Vergers, the same man who set the current record while driving behind the wheel of the SR8 Supersport back in 2005.
While there’s still no timetable as to when the SR8LM will take the Nurburgring, the folks at Radical are excited about the prospects of having one of its own break a record it set four years ago. “It’s been several years since we last went for the record, and we’ve carried out a huge amount of development work on the SR8 in the meantime,” said Radical’s Mick Hyde. “The car’s aerodynamics has been considerably improved, now creating more down-force and less drag. In addition, the 2009 chassis is much safer after passing the FIA production sports car crash tests, and the engine is also improved, producing 460 HP and driving through our in-house designed six-speed transmission.”
Troy Corser left his S1000RR Superbike in favor of Nick Heidfeld’s F1 car, for a test run on the Nürburgring track. The swap was found interesting by both BMW pilots, but we understand that Corser had a 500bhp advantage, which is nothing to be neglected.
Although the BMW Sauber F1 car puts down 700bhp and the BMW S1000RR Superbike disposes of 200bhp, the bike is still the one catching the most of our attention simply because Superbike racing is much more spectacular than F1 racing.
See the video and what the pilots have to say about this interesting swap after the break.
The Nurburgring is steeped in racing history, having hosted some of the world’s most storied races for close to 90 years.
Lately, however, the track racing fans simply call ‘The Ring’ has been making headlines in the auto industry for an entirely different reason. A number of the world’s most prestigious car brands have recently opened their own retail stores inside the track, including Ferrari, which opened its latest specialty store at the fabled racing track.
The latest car maker to make their retail debut at the track is Aston Martin, who showed off their One-77 super car at the German Grand Prix a few weeks ago, is joining a list of other marquees that have put their brands at the heart of one of the world’s most famous racing tracks. The move comes in the middle of the track’s reinvention with the objective of broadening the destination as more than just a race track, but, apparently, also as a shopping destination.
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