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Once you’ve got past your first couple of driving lessons 70mph really doesn’t feel that fast, but crank that up to 100mph (on a closed course like the Goodwood Motor Circuit, naturally) and you’ll probably feel more aware of how fast you’re moving. Well what about doing 102mph indoors, where there are pillars to hit and a very solid wall to hit straight ahead of you? That would feel very fast indeed, and it’s exactly what Porsche has just done, setting a new world record in the process.
Video: Porsche breaks indoor world speed record
The exact record was 102.6mph, or 165km/h, set by American racer Leh Keen in a Taycan Turbo S, the EV super-saloon with 625PS (460kW) that can get to 62mph in 2.8 seconds. That sort of acceleration would have been impossible for Keen on the polished floor of the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans, USA, but the Taycan's all-wheel-drive did at least mean that most of the 761Nm of torque wasn't just spun away.
Porsche took the record from four-time WRC runner-up Mikko Hirvonen, whose record of 86.99mph (140km/h), set in a Speed Car XTRM Crosskart at the Helsinki Expo Centre, Finland, had gone unbroken since 2013. Before that, the Top Gear nerds among you (me included) will remember the programme set the first unofficial indoor speed record in 2005, with ‘The Stig’ driving a Toyota TF105 V10 F1 car to 81mph.
Now, Porsche, if you could please bring the 919 Hybrid Evo out of retirement for one more run that would be grand…
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