it's well known that drag racing is boring and steering yokes are corny.
this is a thread for all intelligent, like minded people of good will. the weak chinned need not apply.
source: https://www.motortrend.com/reviews/...e=braze&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=webpush
The 2024 Lucid Air Sapphire and Tesla Model S Plaid are so evenly matched, you could mistake them for the same car on paper. Both EVs use three motors to crank out four-digit horsepower figures, claimed sub-two-second 0-60-mph times, and advertised three-digit top speeds that start with a 2. They both cover roughly 400 miles in EPA testing and their fast-charging capabilities make interstate road trips possible. Even the names on the tire sidewalls—Michelin Pilot Sport 4S—are the same. Scan our specs at the end of this story and there's just one line that doesn't match up: Price.
No one should be surprised that a car called Sapphire costs more than one named Plaid, but the $158,870 chasm between the starting price of a Model S Plaid and an Air Sapphire can't be explained away with logic. If Lucid had its way, we'd be comparing its new 1,234-hp crown jewel to a Ferrari or a McLaren or a used MiG fighter—really anything that would make the $250,500 price look reasonable while showing off the Sapphire's unrelenting acceleration, carbon-ceramic brakes, brilliant chassis tuning, and lavish interior. Problem is, we can't look at a Sapphire without thinking about the car that made the same claims back in 2021. Call us basic, but we like our apples compared with apples.
Tesla declined to provide a Model S Plaid for this test so we borrowed a meticulously maintained 2022 model with less than 10,000 miles on the clock from a reader, Jeremy at racing organizer DriveNASA. Don't get hung up on the model year. They sell new Plaids with the same tires, brakes, and 1,020 hp as Jeremy's for as little as $91,630 today, a roughly $40K discount from when the car first went on sale.
Can the Lucid with its similar performance claims possibly be worth 2.5 times as much as the Tesla? Well there is another key distinction between these two that doesn't show up in any of the specs: How they drive. After blasting down an airport runway, wringing around our figure-eight circuit, snaking through California valleys, and logging long highway drives, we can report that there's far more to this match up than price.
The quickest production cars we've ever tested demand patience. For maximum performance, you need to precondition the batteries in both cars, a process that took about 20 minutes in the Air and 30 minutes in the Model S on a cool morning in the California desert. If you don't have the time to wait, don't sweat it. You can skip the warmup and your inner ear will never detect the difference. More annoying is that it takes a full eight Mississippi for the Plaid's air springs to lower the front end into its "Cheetah" stance after you stand on both pedals. Hopefully the light hasn't turned green while you were waiting.
Things get a bit blurry—in every sense of the word—at this point. In either car, the driver becomes a passenger the moment they release the brake pedal. The Tesla skitters off the line with a slight scrape from its slipping Michelins. If the Lucid's tires spin—and they almost certainly do—it's not obvious to the driver. By the time you gather your wits to look at the speedometer, 60 mph is long gone. The Sapphire shot through the mile-a-minute mark just 106 feet and 2.20 seconds after launch. The Plaid trailed it by a mere 0.04 second.
Both companies have resisted the urge to fill their cabins with sci-fi caterwauls from the speakers, so it's entirely on your eyes to make sense of what's happening. When your conscious thoughts finally catch up with your body around the quarter-mile point, you're moving so fast you'll be convinced you've covered a half mile. The Lucid hit 156.0 mph with its 9.27-second quarter, while the Tesla notched a 9.55-second run at 150.2 mph.
As absolutely bananas as those numbers are, we've previously pushed a Sapphire prototype and a 2021 Plaid to even quicker times on unprepped tracks. Looking exclusively at production cars tested on street-like surfaces, the Lucid Air Sapphire and Tesla Model S Plaid share the honors of the quickest cars we've ever tested. The Model S still reigns as the 0-60 king with its 2.07-second 2021 performance while the Sapphire's 9.27-second run from this test claims the quarter-mile crown. We needed the half mile to be the best-of-three tie-breaker, you see.
Tesla advertises a 200-mph top speed, but you'll only get there if you pony up for the $20,000 Track package that's installed at a service center after assembly. It adds carbon-ceramic brakes, upgraded brake fluid, forged 20-inch wheels, stickier tires, and the updated firmware that unlocks the elevated top speed. In Drag Strip mode, the standard Plaid runs into its limiter at 163 mph shortly after finishing the quarter-mile. We could raise that to 174 mph by using our car's Track mode, but then you lose the ability to do max fury, Cheetah mode launches. We tried it both ways and found that the harder launch made for the quickest half-mile runs.
The Tesla stops the half-mile timer in 15.2 seconds while riding its 163.1-mph governor. Don't blame the limiter for the Plaid's loss, though. You can feel the Sapphire pulling harder at any triple-digit speed. It smashes through the half mile 0.7 second quicker than the Tesla with a preposterous 14.5-second, 185.9-mph run.
this is a thread for all intelligent, like minded people of good will. the weak chinned need not apply.
source: https://www.motortrend.com/reviews/...e=braze&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=webpush
Power + Money: 2024 Lucid Air Sapphire vs. Tesla Model S Plaid!
The quickest cars we’ve ever tested face off in a battle of performance, range, and fast-charging speed.
The 2024 Lucid Air Sapphire and Tesla Model S Plaid are so evenly matched, you could mistake them for the same car on paper. Both EVs use three motors to crank out four-digit horsepower figures, claimed sub-two-second 0-60-mph times, and advertised three-digit top speeds that start with a 2. They both cover roughly 400 miles in EPA testing and their fast-charging capabilities make interstate road trips possible. Even the names on the tire sidewalls—Michelin Pilot Sport 4S—are the same. Scan our specs at the end of this story and there's just one line that doesn't match up: Price.
No one should be surprised that a car called Sapphire costs more than one named Plaid, but the $158,870 chasm between the starting price of a Model S Plaid and an Air Sapphire can't be explained away with logic. If Lucid had its way, we'd be comparing its new 1,234-hp crown jewel to a Ferrari or a McLaren or a used MiG fighter—really anything that would make the $250,500 price look reasonable while showing off the Sapphire's unrelenting acceleration, carbon-ceramic brakes, brilliant chassis tuning, and lavish interior. Problem is, we can't look at a Sapphire without thinking about the car that made the same claims back in 2021. Call us basic, but we like our apples compared with apples.
Tesla declined to provide a Model S Plaid for this test so we borrowed a meticulously maintained 2022 model with less than 10,000 miles on the clock from a reader, Jeremy at racing organizer DriveNASA. Don't get hung up on the model year. They sell new Plaids with the same tires, brakes, and 1,020 hp as Jeremy's for as little as $91,630 today, a roughly $40K discount from when the car first went on sale.
Can the Lucid with its similar performance claims possibly be worth 2.5 times as much as the Tesla? Well there is another key distinction between these two that doesn't show up in any of the specs: How they drive. After blasting down an airport runway, wringing around our figure-eight circuit, snaking through California valleys, and logging long highway drives, we can report that there's far more to this match up than price.
The Quickest Cars In MotorTrend History
Back in 2021, we launched a Model S Plaid to 60 mph in 1.98 seconds, and Lucid says its Sapphire can beat that with a 1.89-second holeshot. Neither of these cars broke the 2.0-second barrier during testing for this story, though. To squeak under that mark previously, the Plaid needed a drag strip prepped with tacky traction compound and Lucid's advertised time relies on the same sleight of hand. For this test we used a street-like surface, following our standard test procedures with one exception. To ensure we had a clear winner, we doubled the length of our race to a half mile.The quickest production cars we've ever tested demand patience. For maximum performance, you need to precondition the batteries in both cars, a process that took about 20 minutes in the Air and 30 minutes in the Model S on a cool morning in the California desert. If you don't have the time to wait, don't sweat it. You can skip the warmup and your inner ear will never detect the difference. More annoying is that it takes a full eight Mississippi for the Plaid's air springs to lower the front end into its "Cheetah" stance after you stand on both pedals. Hopefully the light hasn't turned green while you were waiting.
Things get a bit blurry—in every sense of the word—at this point. In either car, the driver becomes a passenger the moment they release the brake pedal. The Tesla skitters off the line with a slight scrape from its slipping Michelins. If the Lucid's tires spin—and they almost certainly do—it's not obvious to the driver. By the time you gather your wits to look at the speedometer, 60 mph is long gone. The Sapphire shot through the mile-a-minute mark just 106 feet and 2.20 seconds after launch. The Plaid trailed it by a mere 0.04 second.
Both companies have resisted the urge to fill their cabins with sci-fi caterwauls from the speakers, so it's entirely on your eyes to make sense of what's happening. When your conscious thoughts finally catch up with your body around the quarter-mile point, you're moving so fast you'll be convinced you've covered a half mile. The Lucid hit 156.0 mph with its 9.27-second quarter, while the Tesla notched a 9.55-second run at 150.2 mph.
As absolutely bananas as those numbers are, we've previously pushed a Sapphire prototype and a 2021 Plaid to even quicker times on unprepped tracks. Looking exclusively at production cars tested on street-like surfaces, the Lucid Air Sapphire and Tesla Model S Plaid share the honors of the quickest cars we've ever tested. The Model S still reigns as the 0-60 king with its 2.07-second 2021 performance while the Sapphire's 9.27-second run from this test claims the quarter-mile crown. We needed the half mile to be the best-of-three tie-breaker, you see.
Tesla advertises a 200-mph top speed, but you'll only get there if you pony up for the $20,000 Track package that's installed at a service center after assembly. It adds carbon-ceramic brakes, upgraded brake fluid, forged 20-inch wheels, stickier tires, and the updated firmware that unlocks the elevated top speed. In Drag Strip mode, the standard Plaid runs into its limiter at 163 mph shortly after finishing the quarter-mile. We could raise that to 174 mph by using our car's Track mode, but then you lose the ability to do max fury, Cheetah mode launches. We tried it both ways and found that the harder launch made for the quickest half-mile runs.
The Tesla stops the half-mile timer in 15.2 seconds while riding its 163.1-mph governor. Don't blame the limiter for the Plaid's loss, though. You can feel the Sapphire pulling harder at any triple-digit speed. It smashes through the half mile 0.7 second quicker than the Tesla with a preposterous 14.5-second, 185.9-mph run.
