April 4, 2013

Bugatti Veyron loses top speedster label 265.7mph-capable Hennessey Venom GT

by Gareth Mankoo

Some benchmarks are made to be surpassed. In fact, the Bugatti Veyron has held the top land speed record for a while now and that’s nothing short of surprising. However, the spotlight quickly moved away from the manufacturer’s flagship and settled pleasantly on the Hennessey Venom GT, This speedster was announced on February 9th this year and has managed to win many-a-heart with a powerful 265.7mph record. The test was conducted on the United States Naval Air Station and logged by VBOX officials. The Veyron Super Sport was able to achieve 267.8 mph during its tests. However, Bugatti, limited its actual production vehicles to only 258 mph. ‘Hennessey Performance CEO, John Hennessey, stated that as impressive as the Venom GT’s 265.7 mph performance was, the 2.9 mile runway they were testing on was “far too short for the Venom GT to reach it’s true top speed.”’

Another record set by the Venom GT was a climb from still to 60 mph in 3.05 seconds. It also set a new Guinness World Record by scaling from 0-300 kmph in 13.63 seconds, thus winning the accolade of being ‘the quickest accelerating production vehicle in the world’. There will only be 29 Venom GTs produced and will sell for $1.2 million each.