I periodically go on backroads drives with a group of exotic car owners here in the Bay Area. While we drive fast, everyone is careful to stay on their side of the road and slow way down for blind curves, bicyclists and pedestrians. That said, when the road is open the speed limits are ignored. Yesterday's turnout was above average, with 4 McLaren's, 3 Lambo's, 3 Ferrari's, a Porsche GT2 and 2 others, a Ford GT, and believe it or not, 2 $1.6M Pagani Huayra's!
Having been impressed with the acceleration and handling of my P85D, I had decided to bring it yesterday to see whether it could hang with the supercars. I'm happy to report that it did. It can accelerate as fast or faster than any of them, and the cornering is surprisingly good for such a heavy car. Understeer is definitely present, and the tires protest a bit in hard cornering, but only the most experienced drivers in 2 of the McLarens would consistently pull away. I personally need to get more comfortable getting on the throttle earlier in a corner to take advantage of the front motor's ability to help counter the understeer.
Several drivers said they were impressed with how fast the P85D was. I was surprised at the general lack of knowledge about Tesla among this group of motorheads. Most had not heard of the P85D and were amazed that it has 691 HP.
The only negative for the day was that I couldn't join the group for lunch afterwards because I was going to run out of range. I made it home with 20 miles of indicated range after driving 145 miles on a full charge. Usage was 465 wh/mi, which works out to 161 miles of range given that there are 75 usable kwh's in the 85 kwh battery.
Here's a fuzzy pic of the Huayra as I as starting to give chase on Hwy 9 coming out of Boulder Creek.
Having been impressed with the acceleration and handling of my P85D, I had decided to bring it yesterday to see whether it could hang with the supercars. I'm happy to report that it did. It can accelerate as fast or faster than any of them, and the cornering is surprisingly good for such a heavy car. Understeer is definitely present, and the tires protest a bit in hard cornering, but only the most experienced drivers in 2 of the McLarens would consistently pull away. I personally need to get more comfortable getting on the throttle earlier in a corner to take advantage of the front motor's ability to help counter the understeer.
Several drivers said they were impressed with how fast the P85D was. I was surprised at the general lack of knowledge about Tesla among this group of motorheads. Most had not heard of the P85D and were amazed that it has 691 HP.
The only negative for the day was that I couldn't join the group for lunch afterwards because I was going to run out of range. I made it home with 20 miles of indicated range after driving 145 miles on a full charge. Usage was 465 wh/mi, which works out to 161 miles of range given that there are 75 usable kwh's in the 85 kwh battery.
Here's a fuzzy pic of the Huayra as I as starting to give chase on Hwy 9 coming out of Boulder Creek.
