The Mercedes-AMG One hypercar has shattered the production car lap record at the Nürburgring.
With long time Mercedes GT3 driver and Nürburgring 24 Hour winner Maro Engel at the wheel, the One lapped in 6min 35.1sec, taking over 8sec off the previous record set by the Porsche 911 GT2 RS MR in 2021. The car was in a configuration available to customers and fully road legal.
The time would have earned fourth spot on the grid of the 1983 Nürburgring 1000km, the last time that race was held on the Nordschleife, and while track modifications mean it is a little faster now than then, the fact a car entitled to wear a number plate is as quick now as all but the fastest pure prototype, ground effect, slicks and wings Porsche 956s were back then is instructive.
Not least because the car could have gone faster still. The time was set at the end of October in far from optimal conditions for such an exercise. The track temperature was lower than the tyres would have liked and the surface both damp and dirty in certain key places. But with a weather window of just one hour in which any chance of taking the record was possible, they simply went with what they had.
But there’s another way of looking at this: would it not have been far more remarkable if the One had not smashed the record? It is, after all, a purpose-built hypercar of which just 275 will be made, costing £2.4 million, with an F1 engine developing over 1000bhp. That it went so much faster than a Porsche 911 with 300 fewer horsepower costing a tenth of the money is perhaps not so surprising after all.
What this is, then, is a new front opening up in the Nürburgring lap time wars. The ‘Ring has even acknowledged it by creating a ‘Super Sports’ category in which the One now resides. What’s going to happen should Aston Martin decide to have a go with the Valkyrie? On paper you’d say it should go faster still. Possibly much faster. Where will this all end? Sooner or later, with a very big bill.
