SSC Ultimate Aero and Venom GT unleashed

I’m thinking as fast as I can, but it’s just not fast enough. Out here, 1,800m up in the arid Nevada desert on a dead-straight road, everything’s happening very quickly and I’m struggling to understand what’s going on. I’ve just slotted the Hennessey Venom GT into fifth gear at around 180mph, pushed the throttle to the floor and the small, Alcantara-clad steering wheel is now wildly thrashing from side to side in my sweating fists.

I keep my foot down, hoping the car will straighten itself out, but a split-second later the monstrous 6.2-litre twin-turboed motor unleashes another huge, whistling wrecking ball of power.

Words: Pat Devereux
Pictures: Anton Watts

This feature first appeared in the NOvember 2011 issue of Top Gear magazine

It wasn’t even close. Partly because the SSC was sick, as we would later discover, but also because the Venom is so monumentally savage in its delivery.

We are out here in Nowhere, NV, en route to the start of the Silver State Classic Challenge in Ely. It’s a cross between a time trial and a race over 90 miles of closed public road, with a host of super and very un-super cars taking part. There are classes for different average speeds ranging from 95mph up to the 180mph and Unlimited class. And it’s as much about timing as speed.

Each weighs around 1,270kg. Claimed 0-60mph figures are 2.78secs for the Ultimate Aero and 2.5secs for the Venom GT. Top speeds are still theoretical at this point, but SSC claims 273mph (its previous world-record run was 257.4mph) and Hennessey 2mph more - 275mph at the 7,200rpm redline in top gear (sixth). Both have a Cd of around 0.35.

In the rare metals and carbon fibre they are made of, though, they couldn’t be more different. The Ultimate Aero is definitely from the Nineties - classic, low, flat and wide school of supercar design, inside and out. All the bodywork is carbon fibre, there are two huge intakes on the front of the rear wheelarches and it has its own party piece - twin pop-up air brakes that emerge at an angle from the top of the rear wings.

By comparison, if you did the same thing in the Venom GT, you’d say Lotus Exige. And you’d be right as that’s exactly what most of it is. The wheel has been replaced by a detachable racing unit, there’s a boost gauge in front of the gearstick and a new carbon cowl around the shift mechanism. Other than that, and some tasteful splashes of Alcantara, it’s all Hethel minimalist.

We’ve already drooled over its Castriota-designed form before, but we wanted to get all three cars together so you can see it in context of the before and after. It’s going to be packing a new 9,400rpm, 1,340bhp engine under those be-winged carbon-fibre haunches, and there are a number of still-secret details which makes Jerod Shelby quietly confident he’ll be in with a shout for the world’s fastest car.

Not that ultimate speed is only what the Tuatara is going to be about. Handling will be the central story at launch. “When we come out it’s going to be Nürburgring first,” says Shelby. “We are working with Michelin on a tyre rated for a new world record of speed. We’ll be the first ones to have that. But it’s also a tyre that we feel very confident we can use to break the Nürburgring record for our type of car.”

“They broke the record in July; in August, we were in Monterey unveiling the Tuatara to some private clients. So that was one month after they broke the record. Immediately, the press said, ‘Ooh, this is SSC’s answer to their record.’ All of a sudden it showed us everyone out there thinks that top speed is all we do.”

Just a few miles on a gently winding road in the Ultimate Aero shows that isn’t the case. The suspension is well sorted, the steering accurate and the aero at speed does keep it nailed to the road. It’s the engine that is somewhat disappointing on this one. Before driving the Venom it feels fast, just not supercar fast. Rowing it through the gears, the turbo wastegates twittering away in mechanical surround sound, the speed builds rapidly to about 150mph, but then disappointingly starts running out of puff.

The Venom makes almost every other car this side of a V8 Ariel Atom feel slow. You want numbers? A Bugatti Veyron takes a scant 24.2 seconds to hit 200mph from rest. The Venom GT takes just 15.3.
And it lets you know it every time you get behind the wheel, which is exactly what John Hennessey planned.

“We wanted the Venom GT to be a challenge,” he says. “It’s the automotive equivalent of skiing down a double black diamond [near vertical and for heroes only] run. You risk a lot by doing it, but the buzz and sense of achievement just go on and on.” And on…

Talking of which brings us to the engine again. Loosely based on a Corvette LS9 from the ZR-1 engine, with the supercharger replaced by two turbochargers, even in Certain Death mode it’s still barely ticking over. According to Hennessey, it’s been designed and constructed to produce close to 2,000bhp if needed.

Two thousand? “Oh yeah, there’s plenty more in there,” he says, matter of factly as we pull up at
the truck stop that acts as the holding pen for the cars of the Silver State Challenge.

The full story will have to wait for another time as, right now, John is not focused on looking back and reliving old glories. He’s looking as far into the distance as he can, at beating the Bugatti Veyron Super Sport’s world record. He knows the Venom GT can do it and, having driven it, we don’t have much doubt either. The only problem for him might be the SSC Tuatara lurking in the wings. We won’t know what that’s like to drive until early next year, but it’s promising to be extraordinary too.