Porsche has set the fastest lap times at Laguna Seca and Nürburgring with an EV

There are few more important benchmarks in the automotive universe than lap times. We saw how the early 2000s were dominated by manufacturers taking their cars to the Nürburgring, which some reviewers (*cough* James May *cough*) said just made them worse. There is some truth to it, but in this case, I’d argue that the Taycan needed to set the bar a bit higher for everyone else to follow suit.

The Porsche Taycan Turbo GT is already a fast car and available this spring to customers. Porsche gave their new car the “Weissach package, ” making the car more track-oriented and removing the rear seats. Attack Mode was added allowing for 120kW of additional power for 10 seconds at the press of a button—just like push-to-pass. This boost in power is displayed on the dash with animated rings on the speedometer. This mode is 50kW more power than the ordinary push-to-pass mode in Taycan models and can be activated also by the right-hand paddle.

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The Taycan Turbo GT with and without the Weissach package comes in with 580kW of power. With Launch Control that number goes up to 760kW of over-boost and up to 815kW for two seconds, making this car capable of hiding 0-62 MPH in 2.2 seconds. This is assisted by the fact the GT is 75kg (165lbs) lighter than the Turbo S. Carbon parts were used on b-pillars, door mirrors, side skirt inlays, and other places. CFRP seats and omitting the soft closing function of the tailgate helped as well.

Going faster was also assisted by the inclusion of standard Porsche Ceramic Composite Brakes (PCCBs). They even tweaked these a bit shaving two kilograms (4.4 lbs.) off and added a “Victory Gold” color. Aerodynamically speaking, the adaptive spoiler has a Gurney flap added in a high-gloss carbon-weave finish.  

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All of this added up to a record-setting lap time of 1:27.87 minutes at Laguna Seca in Monterrey, California—faster than any other road-approved electric car. On top of that, they took the car home to the Nürburgring and set a new class record for four-door vehicles of 7:07.55 minutes. Clearly, the bar has been raised, yet again, by Porsche