Top Gear 918 vs. La Ferrari vs. P1

Absolutely spot on. Ferrari, just as Porsche and McLaren would likely do, wanted to ensure that the car came fresh with tyres, fuel and other variable consumables in the best condition, and why not? If you want to test a multi million dollar car, it should be in it's best overall condition. If wheels are out of balance, or fuel is tainted, this can affect the results by tenths and hundreds of seconds, and these are the measurements that in this company make the difference to win or lose.

You cannot knock the brand for protecting it's reputation and interests.

McLaren on the other hand do appear somewhat sheepish, as the TG track is their home test track, and as such should be well known. However, imagine you bring your Ferrari to my house, challenge me to a race In my range rover - would you let me dictate the terms, and then carry out the test on a muddy hill? No chance. Would you let me race your 458 in a Gallardo/huracan on a wet race track with lots of corners and no straights? Unlikely, the conditions would favour me too much.

A sensible race would be a track where the conditions are equalised for all competitors, and the cars prepared with new tyres, oils, tyres etc, and serviced to their optimum.

 

There are no losers here, just a single winner -- Porsche. I don't buy the argument that because Ferrari never claimed fastest that it provides them some sort of out. This is hypercars we're talking about, not GT cars, not their base sports cars. The F40 reigned supreme, bar none. It bested the 959, overall, though the 959 was an earlier release (and came pretty close). It beat the 959 on performance and visceral driving experience. It became "the" icon. Sad to say, but the subsequent offerings by Ferrari weren't as dominant. The F50, though an amazing car, was a disappointment when put up against the F40. The Enzo was great, and was certainly up there with the best in the world, but didn't really dominate overall in the way the F40 did. In the background, tainting nearly everything, was the F1, making other hypercars look less impressive, even when released a few years later.

I imagine the LaF is "up there" in terms of performance... it is disappointing that Ferrari is playing this game and I don't give the excuse that they build it for some mystique or for the experience any credit -- mystique and legendary status in the end is earned, not done through what is a strange (counterintuitive) type of marketing hype. The F40 earned it, these subsequent offerings don't and instead are relying on low production volumes -- the supply side of the equation rather than the demand side, so to speak.

 

The point here is not so much which car is faster but more importantly is the behavior and attitude of the manufacturers. McLaren and Ferrari are clearly very worried their cars were not match up to the Porsche. Ferrari makes matter severely worse by the pettiness of threatening current owners of the car who might be interested in offering their personal vehicle for the test. These individuals have purchased many Ferraris in the past, otherwise they would not have been granted the honor of Ferrari accepting their payment of $1.4 million. I guess that is Ferrari's way of showing gratitude for their patronage.

BTW- Porsche was perfectly accepting of Top Gear using the 918 in the studio for inclusion in the test. There were no conditions or restrictions. That speaks volumes for their confidence in the car that was created.

 

For any test to be fully authentic, the cars chosen must be regular,stock production.Then each company has the right to send a rep to inspect their own car to ensure that it is up to spec with no issues. This then guarantees the cars are not modified in any way to enhance their performance and the cars are verified to be operating totally pursuant to manufacturer's specifications. No excuses afterwards. Same track, same driver, same conditions. Reluctance by any manufacturer to adhere to this methodology is inexcusable and indicative of lacking confidence in the performance of their car.

 

Mclaren hasn't threatened any P1 owners. So this leaves just Ferrari. Like I said, TopGear can buy one on the open market, test it, then sell it with autographs, footage, meet and greet and documentation. That car would be worth alot. Especially if it comes out on top.

Even if they spend $3M and sell it for $2.5M or at a profit of $3M plus with all the add on goodies it isn't material to their budget. They are a huge show in the UK and worldwide. That 500k loss or gain is not material.

To prevent claims of bad tires, foul play, etc they could have a couple auditors on hand for outfitting the tires, balancing, fueling, etc and film it all to document.

We already saw one shootout go haywire with the P1 and 918. The 918 beat the P1. Mclaren then shows up and puts on Trofeo tires and then beats the 918. Of course the stickier Trofeo's would do better. Tires matter as we all know. They should outfit each car with the same or equivalent rubber for an apples to apples comparison.

They might also invite a rep from each company to inspect the vehicles before and after the event. I would say no modifications but they can raise their hand and indicate if something is wrong or off before the race begins. Then, up to TopGear to decide if the claim is valid, document it on film and then fix it or not.

 

And Top Gear would never see a new Ferrari again

 

Yes, but the problem with that is that two manus want the cars to be factory and one doesn't. Mac already did a customer comparison between the P1 and the 918 and the P1 still lost. They came with the trofeo's and they still lost. I think it would probably be better for them if they also came with a factory car too. But, here's a good example of what happened on top gear: if you have five friends, four wants to go skiing and one want to go rock climbing, who wins the majority in that match? Four people beat one, right? So now everyone has to go along with what the other four said and just deal with it and go skiing.

 

No matter how you slice and dice this situation, McLaren looks chicken scared but even worse, Ferrari looks bad, very, very bad.

 

FOr some reason, i just salute Porsche. They didn't give a sh!!t and reminds me of Chuck Norris.

 

Porsche is confident that it created the best car in the world and is telling all others to bring it on.

 

The 918 and LaFerrari are using the most powerful NA V8 and NA V12 and emissions aren't the problem. McLaren is creating boogiemen where they don't exist.

 

What if McLaren have built the P1 such that while checking it for fitness, they're able to switch the ECU of a customer car to get more performance for a test? That's not fair either but completely possible. Tests have always been done with factory cars. Put them on a dyno, weigh them, check the tyres to make sure all is standard and off you go. Someone's just trying to muddy up the water and get away with murder

 

The out come of this test will make no difference to the car makers except a bit of ego damage and even more motivation when making their next hyper car. I think its silly that there is the "FEAR" of being beaten by any of these amazing machines. Each one does it slightly different….but isn't that the whole point! What happened to the good ol' days of balls out tests….top gear needs to challenge all the car makers and call them out….I am sure they can make a massive media campaign on the back of this!

Back to the cars….They should go out and call some high profile customers who would be happy to challenge ferrari ban on ltd edition cars and let em go all out on the track. I just wanna see them rip it up. I actually think the track time is slightly a non-issue….all cars in the real world are on the same page, the rest is driver preference.

MJ

 

Here's the thing -- personally, of the 3 cars I would choose the LaF if I had the funds. I don't have the funds. Not that they'd want my funds, but you get the point.

However, Porsche is the clear winner to me from this latest round of the hypercar war. They built the most impressive machine technically. They have built the highest performing machine in the most appropriate benchmark (Nurburgring). They have outshone expectations around the machine by doing what Porsche does best, exceeding performance expectations.

I find the front end of the 918 rather boring and overall think the LaF is the one I'd want to have, money-no-object. But, objectively, Porsche outdid the competition here in the way I would benchmark hypercars, which should be performance and/or technical achievement first.

 

Unless someone loans them one. Plenty of people that will (save for super Ferraris so far).

When Top Gear wanted to test the Enzo Ferrari wouldn't give them one either. Nick Mason lend them his and I'm pretty sure he's been getting new Ferrari's after that still...

I'm sure we'll see a time by all cars on the top gear track. I just really hope it'll all on the same day (not that that would stop the fools arguing on the internet, though).

 

If Porsche are ever defeated in any one of these three way tests, they will not say a thing. Ever.

Ferrari and Mclaren will only ever end up looking silly for either declining to participate OR excuse-making later.


The 918 is a triumph. They've sold all 918 cars... That's sensational. People found it compelling enough in spite of the (large) production numbers. Clearly the purchases were more to do with the product than the investment factor. WELL DONE.

 

Porsche has the least to loose given their car is the cheapest and never claimed anything. When the same basic company did the Veyron they did not want it tested even if "factory" at all because anything else than first would have been a defeat

 

What is the "same basic company"? VW?

Porsche was a completely independent company at that time. Largely still is, in terms of management control.

Veyron was spec tested and no limits placed on owners. For the clear objectives the Veyron had, they hit all of them, and exceeded them brilliantly. It is still undefeated for what it is, 10 years later...

 

It had been some 4 years or so before a customer lent a crashed one to Top Gear for the track test that VW did not want to have. So it's not only Ferrari who behave like this. And no limits to customers because they finished selling them just a week ago. So could not really say we are not going to give you another one when they're crying out for customers. And porsche was "completely independent" (not too sure of that) then, but we are talking of today's porsche aren't we?

 

This guy owns all three: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-s7UiQ3sOwI

He uses his P1 to pick up his LaF and 918 from the Fcar and Pcar dealers on the same day! He says at the end the next time we'll see the cars is at Silverstone. I'm guessing it will be him driving them around the track giving some opinions on it rather than putting a racedriver in each to do hot laps.

The 918 is the best looking one imo. I love that color combo and the extra aero bits.

 

I read this at Jalopnik a few days back. a poster there summarized it up pretty well.

 

That's moronic.

 

Why is that moronic. Pretty accurate in its description.

 

Where have you read that? Ahm, at Jalopnik.. ;-)