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It’s Nurburgring record season all right.
Following Gumpert’s announcement yesterday that its Apollo Speed had a set a new Nurburgring production car lap record at 7m11s, British manufacturer Radical has claimed its SR8LM has lapped the Nordschliefe in 6m48s.
The more astute amongst you will have noticed that 6m48s is quite a bit quicker than 7m11s. Game over, you might think – victory to Radical.
But the controversy arises because the SR8LM sits right at the very edge of the definition of ‘road legal’. It’s a lightweight, trackday special with very few compromises to real-world stuff like, say, weather.
However, Radical says it set the Nurburgring record just 24 hours after driving flat-out from England to Germany. Racing driver Michael Vergers – who set a lap time of 6m56s in the SR8LM’s predecessor back in 2005 – was once again behind the wheel for the most recent record attempt.
“The car was great, I could push really hard and it felt clearly faster than the previous SR8 in 2005,” Vergers said. “It’s fantastic that we’ve beaten the record; hopefully I’ll get an opportunity to return with Radical in the future.”
So who does the lap record belong too? Gumpert? Radical? Or maybe even Dodge? Well, that depends on your definition of ‘road legal’. Let the patented Top Gear speed bump decide, we say…
Open Car Bar
What do you think?
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PetrolheadViper commented on this article
at 01:17 pm on 21 August 2009
Arggh who the hell cares. If they drove it on the road to the nurburgring then its road legal so let them have I say. Anything to beat the Germans lol.
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DugyC commented on this article
at 01:21 pm on 21 August 2009
Yep agree with PHV. They drove it through many european countries to the 'ring. Definitely a lot more comfortable than riding a motorbike. I'm hoping they used the same tyres, but at best they changed them for the same type.
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DugyC commented on this article
at 01:21 pm on 21 August 2009
Yep agree with PHV. They drove it through many european countries to the 'ring. Definitely a lot more comfortable than riding a motorbike. I'm hoping they used the same tyres, but at best they changed them for the same type.
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sweetlizard commented on this article
at 01:39 pm on 21 August 2009
Well, I guess Radical got it... even if the car isn't really road-friendly, it's still road legal. Which is amazing, can you imagine one of those park in front of your house?
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Klasco commented on this article
at 01:52 pm on 21 August 2009
Gumpert is the winner why because it has a roof.
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