Tesla P100D Isn – t the World – s Fastest Car – Tesla Acceleration vs
The Tesla Model S P100D Is Not the “Fastest Car in the World”
“Fastest” refers to top speed. “Quickest” refers to acceleration. They’re different, and almost everybody is getting it wrong.
Tesla earned headlines across the media yesterday with the announcement of the Model S P100D. “Tesla just made its Model S the fastest fresh car you can buy,” wrote Business Insider. “Tesla lays claim to world’s fastest production car,” said the Associated Press. “Even more ludicrous: Elon Musk says Tesla now has the world’s fastest production car,” wrote the L.A. Times.
The problem is, these headlines are all wrong. Tesla didn’t build the fastest car in the world. It built the quickest car presently on sale. And if you put it in a haul race against a certain Ferrari and a certain Porsche, it would come in third place.
Let’s clear this up grade-school style. The Cambridge Dictionary explains that “we usually use quick to refer to something happening in a brief time, or a shorter than expected time.” By contrast, “swift refers to things that happen or go at high speed.” In the automotive world, “swift” refers to a car’s top speed, the maximum velocity it can reach; “quick” refers to the time it takes to get to that speed.
And indeed, Tesla has built a very quick car. By the standard measure of a vehicle’s acceleration, the time it takes to go from zero to sixty mph, the Model S P100D is tied with the Porsche nine hundred eleven Turbo S for the title of quickest fresh car you can buy today. Thanks to a fresh, more energy-dense battery, Tesla claims the fresh sedan does that sprint in a mere Two.Five seconds; the slightly stronger Model X SUV with the same battery does 0-60 in Two.9 seconds.
But as quick as it is, the Model S P100D isn’t the quickest production car ever built. The Ferrari LaFerrari did 0-60 in Two.Four seconds; the Porsche nine hundred eighteen Spyder did it in Two.Two seconds.
To its credit, Tesla made clear in its announcement that the fresh Model S would get out-sprinted by the LaFerrari and nine hundred eighteen Spyder. The electrified carmaker also pointed out, fairly fairly, that the Ferrari and Porsche hybrid hypercars each cost more than $1 million when they were fresh, with a limited number of each built (499 of the Ferrari, nine hundred eighteen of the Porsche), and that both exotics ended production long ago. If you want the quickest car money can buy, and you want it brand-new with four doors, you’re taking your checkbook to the Tesla shop.
But while Tesla very precisely described the Model S P100D as “the third fastest accelerating production car ever produced,” reporters, bloggers, and newsmakers everywhere lost the nuance. Gizmodo called it “the fastest car you can buy.” SFGate referred to it as the “fastest production car in the world.” AutoExpress, ABC News, The Independent, and slew of others erroneously called it the world’s fastest production car.
The problem is, the Tesla Model S P100D isn’t particularly quick. Like all other versions of the Tesla Model S, it’s limited to a top speed of one hundred fifty five mph. Most luxury automakers limit their high-performance sedans to that same top speed, specified in a “gentleman’s agreement” inbetween Mercedes-Benz, Audi and BMW a number of years ago to slightly mitigate high-speed Autobahn fatalities. But there are dozens of fresh cars today that will send their speedometers way past 155. The Hennessey Venom GT, in fact, will go one hundred fifteen mph quicker than a maxed-out Model S P100D, reaching a verified two hundred seventy mph if you give it enough runway.
This also puts Jalopnik’s headline in a spot somewhere inbetween error and truth. “The Fresh Tesla P100D Is The Fastest Tesla Ever, Goes three hundred Miles On A Charge,” writes my friend Michael Ballaban. Since every currently-available Tesla Model S variant has the same 155-mph top speed, is the P100D the fastest in a six-way tie?
(Mike is very likely going to send me a flurry of angry texts for calling him out. This is the sacrifice I make for you, dear reader.)
Am I being needlessly pedantic? Perhaps. But words have meaning, and when outlets use words inaccurately, it’s a disservice. Tesla has accomplished something extreme with the Model S P100D, but calling it “the world’s fastest car” is like providing Usain Bolt’s gold medals to Michael Phelps.
There is one superlative, however, that Tesla has absolutely earned, and it’s one that scarcely got a mention in P100D coverage: driving range. Tesla says the Model S P100D will go up to three hundred fifteen miles per battery charge, making it the very first mass-produced electrical car in the world to surpass three hundred miles on the EPA’s driving range test.
Unluckily, the headline “Tesla just made the longest-range electrical car you can buy” just doesn’t have that same ring to it.
Tesla P100D Isn – t the World – s Fastest Car – Tesla Acceleration vs
The Tesla Model S P100D Is Not the “Fastest Car in the World”
“Fastest” refers to top speed. “Quickest” refers to acceleration. They’re different, and almost everybody is getting it wrong.
Tesla earned headlines across the media yesterday with the announcement of the Model S P100D. “Tesla just made its Model S the fastest fresh car you can buy,” wrote Business Insider. “Tesla lays claim to world’s fastest production car,” said the Associated Press. “Even more ludicrous: Elon Musk says Tesla now has the world’s fastest production car,” wrote the L.A. Times.
The problem is, these headlines are all wrong. Tesla didn’t build the fastest car in the world. It built the quickest car presently on sale. And if you put it in a haul race against a certain Ferrari and a certain Porsche, it would come in third place.
Let’s clear this up grade-school style. The Cambridge Dictionary explains that “we usually use quick to refer to something happening in a brief time, or a shorter than expected time.” By contrast, “quick refers to things that happen or go at high speed.” In the automotive world, “swift” refers to a car’s top speed, the maximum velocity it can reach; “quick” refers to the time it takes to get to that speed.
And indeed, Tesla has built a very quick car. By the standard measure of a vehicle’s acceleration, the time it takes to go from zero to sixty mph, the Model S P100D is tied with the Porsche nine hundred eleven Turbo S for the title of quickest fresh car you can buy today. Thanks to a fresh, more energy-dense battery, Tesla claims the fresh sedan does that sprint in a mere Two.Five seconds; the slightly stronger Model X SUV with the same battery does 0-60 in Two.9 seconds.
But as quick as it is, the Model S P100D isn’t the quickest production car ever built. The Ferrari LaFerrari did 0-60 in Two.Four seconds; the Porsche nine hundred eighteen Spyder did it in Two.Two seconds.
To its credit, Tesla made clear in its announcement that the fresh Model S would get out-sprinted by the LaFerrari and nine hundred eighteen Spyder. The electrified carmaker also pointed out, fairly fairly, that the Ferrari and Porsche hybrid hypercars each cost more than $1 million when they were fresh, with a limited number of each built (499 of the Ferrari, nine hundred eighteen of the Porsche), and that both exotics ended production long ago. If you want the quickest car money can buy, and you want it brand-new with four doors, you’re taking your checkbook to the Tesla shop.
But while Tesla very precisely described the Model S P100D as “the third fastest accelerating production car ever produced,” reporters, bloggers, and newsmakers everywhere lost the nuance. Gizmodo called it “the fastest car you can buy.” SFGate referred to it as the “fastest production car in the world.” AutoExpress, ABC News, The Independent, and slew of others erroneously called it the world’s fastest production car.
The problem is, the Tesla Model S P100D isn’t particularly quick. Like all other versions of the Tesla Model S, it’s limited to a top speed of one hundred fifty five mph. Most luxury automakers limit their high-performance sedans to that same top speed, specified in a “gentleman’s agreement” inbetween Mercedes-Benz, Audi and BMW a number of years ago to slightly mitigate high-speed Autobahn fatalities. But there are dozens of fresh cars today that will send their speedometers way past 155. The Hennessey Venom GT, in fact, will go one hundred fifteen mph swifter than a maxed-out Model S P100D, reaching a verified two hundred seventy mph if you give it enough runway.
This also puts Jalopnik’s headline in a spot somewhere inbetween error and truth. “The Fresh Tesla P100D Is The Fastest Tesla Ever, Goes three hundred Miles On A Charge,” writes my friend Michael Ballaban. Since every currently-available Tesla Model S variant has the same 155-mph top speed, is the P100D the fastest in a six-way tie?
(Mike is most likely going to send me a flurry of angry texts for calling him out. This is the sacrifice I make for you, dear reader.)
Am I being needlessly pedantic? Perhaps. But words have meaning, and when outlets use words inaccurately, it’s a disservice. Tesla has accomplished something extreme with the Model S P100D, but calling it “the world’s fastest car” is like providing Usain Bolt’s gold medals to Michael Phelps.
There is one superlative, however, that Tesla has absolutely earned, and it’s one that hardly got a mention in P100D coverage: driving range. Tesla says the Model S P100D will go up to three hundred fifteen miles per battery charge, making it the very first mass-produced electrical car in the world to surpass three hundred miles on the EPA’s driving range test.
Unluckily, the headline “Tesla just made the longest-range electrified car you can buy” just doesn’t have that same ring to it.
