“Can you believe something ugly can be fast?” was one colleague’s response to the news that the Porsche Panamera had set the record for the fastest four-door to lap the Nürburgring.By Gareth Dean
Make what you will of the its styling, the 4,8-litre twin-turbo V8 and numerous pieces of Porsche suspension trickery in the Panamera Turbo have helped rally legend Walter Röhrl post a 7 minute, 56 second lap time at the infamous German racetrack.
The new lap record eclipses last year’s 7 minute, 59 second blitz undertaken by a Cadillac CTS-V at the hands of former GM Performance Division boss John Heinricy.
Top put the Panamera’s run around the 20,81 km Nordschleife into perspective, it’s faster than the Mercedes-Benz CLK Black Series (8:02), the current BMW M3 (8:05), E60 BMW M5 (8:13), Audi RS6 (8:06), and in the same league as the Ferrari F360 Challenge Stradale F1.
Porsche is still bitterly contesting the 7: 26,4 lap time set by the Nissan GT-R but should be ecstatic at being able to lay claim to the fastest four-door time on the ‘Ring…Unless Nissan is secretly developing a GT-R-engined Tiida with which to infuriate the folks at Zuffenhausen?
