We're here at the Estoril circuit near Lisbon Portugal with what appears to be
the world's greenest supercar, and it is none other than the lamborghini Aventador SVJ
not only the greenest but by some measures the world's fastest, at least if
you take Nurburgring time seriously. Yes ladies and gentlemen this is the new the
latest record holder at the 'Ring with a time of 6 minutes 44 seconds and change.
I think this car really warms my heart because this is a car that says it's
never too late to change -- it's never too late to improve.
When this car came out in 2011 after development beginning in 2008 it frankly,
was it was an emotional car, it was a powerful car with about 700 horsepower.
What it was not was a good track car and the Nurburgring time proved that.
Get this: almost one full minute slower around the ring than this SVJ.
I can barely get my mind around how you make a similar car -- in many ways the same
car -- same basic engine -- go a minute faster around the 'Ring. Yes this car is powerful:
A six point five liter mid-mounted V12 with now 759 horsepower you know we
talked about what we did like about the Lamborghini let's talk about what we
don't like. It begins with these -- not these big beautiful paddle shifters -- but
what they control: the single clutch transmission that's pretty much I
believe reached the end of its useful life. It's surprising how livable they've made it.
It's fine on track. I'm gonna go into Corsa mode here really back-slapping
shifts and when you're on the track and madding it you know notice how kind of
dizzy and lurching it is that as you would out on the street but as far as a
versatile solution it just can't compete with the best dual-clutch units from
Porsche, Ferrari, et al.
One of the things you really notice about this car is the improved turn in and
that's from the four-wheel drive system that now totally decouples the front
wheels when you're under hard braking you begin to initiate a turn bingo
front wheels have one job to do at that point and that's to steer the car and
they're not tasked with driving the wheels at all so you're in an
exclusively rear drive car as you're entering turns or under hard braking
great stuff as soon as I unwind the wheel and get back on the gas I start
getting a little bit of help from those front wheels.
Some of the particulars at 2.8 seconds 0 to 60 run 8.6 seconds to 124 miles an
hour and a blistering 217 mile an hour top speed 518 thousand dollars or so to
start call it about 550 to 600 thousand dollars once options are in all that
power all that force aside what makes this car almost a minute faster that
round the ring than before well it's the aerodynamics it's the handling it's the
tires it's everything some of the cars secret weapons is the now-famous a lot
system first saw on the Lamborghini Huracan active aerodynamics not just at
the rear but now also at the front let's not overlook the tires and the role that
they play in creating that kind of ring time these Trofeo R tires are very
very sticky very very track capable and over a long period of time which is
critical at a very long ring lap of almost seven minutes long wear
traditional tires might tend to degrade on the street you can offer proudly P-Zero
Corsas -- that's gonna be the choice for the vast majority of buyers
for this car the piece d'resistance is the active aerodynamics front and rear of
the hollow system I'm coming into this turn here not going in full track speeds
actually right now but let's I get out of the brakes and turn in one side of
the Ala wing shuts itself down to let air flow over the top of the wing and
provide maximum downforce the other side of the wing squeezes high-pressure air
out underneath the wing and kind of stalls the wing as just like an airplane
wing would stall and actually helps to generate lift at that corner so you've
got downforce I'm gonna make a right turn here
so I've got downforce on the inside right wheel and a little bit of helping
lift on the outside left wheel to help this very large car pivot around corners
like a much smaller car it's a little Italian ballet
another key to this car is tremendous track performance is that it's secret
weapons don't add any weight well at least they don't when you eliminate
weight elsewhere both the aa system and the new four-wheel steering system are
added into this car but yet it has the exact same curb weight as the previous
Aventador sv now that's call it thirty five hundred and fifty pounds in dry
weight and again tons of Aero work all around see these nifty little these
little flicks on the outside here that take that channels air away from these
spinning wheel arches to avoid that turbulence and gives a nice clean path
of air to go into these giant giant radiators for the V12 ten percent more
cooling efficiency forty percent more aerodynamic efficiency overall
now supercar like this needs a really really big brain when this Lamborghinis
got it it's got a central control system that's just kind of the nerve center of
the car and it is hooked into everything it's hooked into the act of arrow the
four-wheel drive system the 4-wheel steering the Magna ride suspension and
what it does is it anticipates your moves anticipates the operating
conditions of the car and it can make adjustments with just like lightning
speed another key to this cars industry-leading Nurburgring time
changes to the four-wheel drive system this thing was a notorious understeer
car on track meeting you know the harder you push the more it just kind of wanted
to wash out at the front end nothing you could do about it very hard to make this
large car rotate made it feel even more big and unwieldy than this brute already
was handling has just been transformed over the years as we experienced on the
track head into one of these fast turns like at the end of this straightaway
we're of just a few minutes ago I was hitting 170.273 miles an hour on this
very straight when you hammer onto the brakes and this Magna ride suspension is
keeping things nice and stable you might take a look at this and say this car is
gonna be out to kill you but you could put your grandmother behind the wheel of
this car and with I think just a little training she'd be okay it's very
forgiving when you cook a turn a little too fast it just scrubs a little speed
doesn't suddenly snap straighten the wheel get back on the gas you're right
on your way
Lamborghini is rightfully proud of their commitment to a naturally aspirated
old-school v12 engine and they are not giving it up without a fight
the next generation sticking with a v12 and not even a twin-turbo they're going
to use hybrid electric assist to try to keep up with all those turbocharged
competitors but this sound doesn't have to change a whit we're talking explosive
power surprisingly livable handling and forgiving - that's the thing that just
really impressed me with this car in the modern idiom of supercars you can really
extract this performance on road on track
and not feel like you're tempting death with every move Lamborghini Aventador
sdj kind of restores our faith in the supercars testament to that engineering
evolution a car that wasn't all that on track just a few years ago now the king
of the ring the Lamborghini Aventador svj