YouTube The Ford GT is the king of Car & Driver's VIR lightning lap

Mook

Mr. Manager
Staff member
Admin
May 23, 2007
206,696
117,580
Elgin
Real Name
Mike
But just barley.

It wasnt there for the actual competition but Ford gave them one recently and here is the result:

Skip to 1:15 for the lap.

https://youtu.be/PV2gQ6MFunw

Car and Driver was unable to secure a Ford GT for its Lightning Lap event last year. Later on, Ford called back and said that it had one of their EcoBoost spaceships finally ready for some track testing. This is a call I’m still waiting on myself.

The GT proceeded to blast down every straight and turner at VIR. The driver’s helmet camera showed it reaching speeds of over 160 mph. It ate every corner like it was at a Las Vegas buffet and its gym membership just expired.

In the end, the GT set a time of exactly 2:43. That makes it both faster than the Mercedes-AMG GT R (2:43:4) and the Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE (2:45:7) when C/D tested them.
 

Intel

TCG Elite Member
Oct 28, 2009
5,889
3,357
Palatine
I think the more impressive thing is that the ZL1 is only 2 seconds slower.

That was my thought also. It is almost stupid how capable these cars are on the track. I have seen a couple of the camaro's out there at track days and they get down pretty well. I just can't imagine having that power on tap as a noob although the nannys seem to reign things in pretty well.
 

jason05gt

TCG Elite Member
Jan 17, 2007
15,307
7,195
Naperville
100% worth mentioning.

i was worried about the ford white knights though :rofl:

White Knight here....

Different conditions and testing procedures. C&D admitted that had they had more seat time that the GT's lap times would have gone down in seconds.

"Take the GT anywhere else and you’d miss out on 163.6 mph down the front straight (second-highest all-time speed to the 170.6-mph Porsche 918 Spyder); barreling into the Climbing Esses at 148.0 mph (a new LL record); and a neck workout at 1.17 g’s in Turn 1 brought to you by the entertainment firm of EcoBoost, Michelin, and Multimatic spool-valve dampers. Put it together and you get a 2:43.0 lap, fast enough to dethrone the 918 Spyder as the LL king. And this was accomplished in one day with the car. Given our normal three-day exposure, that time would drop, potentially by entire seconds."

That's why I like Randy Pobst's track reviews best. He just gets in and hauls ass, as he should be compared to auto writers.
 

Lord Tin Foilhat

TCG Conspiracy Lead Investigator
TCG Premium
Jul 8, 2007
60,686
56,744
Privy Chamber
But just barley.

It wasnt there for the actual competition but Ford gave them one recently and here is the result:

Skip to 1:15 for the lap.

pup002-pup-pure-planet-just-barley-80g_1.jpg
 

Rent Free

TCG Elite Member
Jan 26, 2015
24,407
20,261
Nowheresville North Dakota
I'd take the GT. The last Gen appreciated very nicely where nice examples are fetching almost double the original MSRP.

True, but id have 5 times the sets of tires to torch and drive the ever living piss out of.

I appreciate the Ford GT but Im no car collector the GT would do me no good as a garage queen. Id rather go torch tires and go blasting through the snow in a ZL1 (on snow tires or coruse) :rofl:

Year round DD in a ZL1 would be manageable I think.
 

Chet Donnelly

TCG Elite Member
TCG Premium
Aug 19, 2004
18,376
38,832
I remember this kid from college that couldn't understand why people would buy a Corvette when you could buy a 2nd gen Mitsubishi Eclipse and look just as good, and go just as fast for a quarter of the price.

No joke, kid really couldn't understand it. He had an Eagle Talon...ran 12's.
 
Old Thread: Hello . There have been no replies in this thread for 90 days.
Content in this thread may no longer be relevant. Consider starting a new thread to get fresh replies.

Thread Info