Volkswagen’s ID.R electric race car has broken the outright record for the Hillclimb at Goodwood Festival of Speed.
Set 20 years ago by F1 star Nick Heidfeld, in a McLaren MP4/13, the ID.R stopped the clocks in a time of 41.18 seconds — shaving more than 4 seconds off the record.
The state-of-the-art ID.R averaged 163.2km/h along the challenging 1.87km course.
Driven by two-time Le Mans 24 Hours-winner Romain Dumas, the Hillclimb record is the third landmark for the all-electric machine.
It follows on the heels of the record the ID.R set earlier this year for an electric car at the famous Nürburgring, with a time of 06:05.33 minutes as well as its outright victory at Pikes Peak in June last year (07.57.15 minutes).
The all-electric ID.R produces 500kW of power and 650Nm of torque, and weighs less than 1100kg — even with the driver on board.
It does the dash from 0-100km/h in an incredible 2.25 seconds thanks to all that instant torque.
Volkswagen Motorsport Director Sven Smeets said the Goodwood Festival of Speed Hillclimb is one of the most iconic Hillclimbs in the world.
“The track is so narrow and difficult to master, with zero room for error,” he said.
“Dumas and the whole Volkswagen team performed flawlessly to set the record.
“A change is taking place in the field of production vehicles and in motorsport. Electric cars are becoming increasingly more powerful and it’s great to see them now rivalling combustion engines on track.
“To get an idea of how far we’ve developed the car, in 2018 we ran a 00:43.86 – this year we were almost three seconds faster.”
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