Ford’s All-Electric SuperVan Smoked a Corvette and Porsche 911 on the Nürburgring

[Desmond Milligan 0]

Ford’s SuperVan just posted a new fast time—beating out a Chevy Corvette ZR1X and Porsche 911 GT3 RS in the process.

The all-electric Ford Transit SuperVan 4.2 completed a lap at the Nürburgring in 6:48.393, which is extremely fast, and faster than the aforementioned Corvette and 911, in addition to cars like the Ford Mustang GTD, the Audi RS Q8, the Mercedes-AMG GT 63 S 4MATIC+, the BMW M4 CSL, and way faster than the Honda Civic Type R.

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The SuperVan’s time of 6:48.393 is almost on a par with the fearsome Mercedes-AMG One, though, like the Corvette, 911, and Mustang, the comparison isn’t quite right. The vehicle is a heavily modified race car, more or less, and not a production model. It has the body of a van but almost none of the other characteristics.

The SuperVan makes 2,000 hp, for one thing, which was enough to set a time on the ‘Ring that is the 9th-fastest ever.

Romain Dumas was the driver of the SuperVan 4.2 on its lap, and the automaker posted a video to prove it. Ford said the run was partly inspired by a Top Gear segment from 2009 when Sabine Schmitz took a Ford Transit around the ‘Ring in 10:08.49. That time was slower than her 10-minute goal—after Jeremy Clarkson had barely managed to get a Jaguar S-Type around in under 10 minutes—but impressive nonetheless. The van drove more than three minutes faster, with a lot of help, including slick tires.

Ford’s SuperVan 4.2 is purely a show-off sort of car, which the marque takes to Bathurst and Pikes Peak to set records or attempt to set records, because everyone likes a hot van. It’s a fun project for Ford engineers, too. Ford says that projects like this also aid in the development of road-going EVs and its racing programs.

“I can’t be specific just yet for competitive reasons, but suffice to say that a number of our future race programs will see the benefits from vehicles like SuperVan 4.2,” Michael Norton, a program manager at Ford, said in a blog post.

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