The “most powerful and quickest” road-legal Lotus has completed a gruelling test session at the Nurburgring Nordschleife and the results are satisfactory, to put it mildly. In its first public outing since its reveal back in June this year, the Lotus 3-Eleven clocked over 2,000 km on the fabled circuit as part of a “comprehensive test and development programme” in the lead up to it entering production in early 2016.
“The success of this test session is proof that our development philosophy for the 3-Eleven is the right way to go. We’ve always said that to make a car faster you must make it lighter and this new car carries that philosophy to a new level,” said Lotus CEO, Jean-Marc Gales. “The 3-Eleven achieved one of the fastest ever lap times around the Nurburgring for any class of car and faster than many other supercars,” he added.
How fast? With a “Sport Auto” magazine lap configuration, the 3-Eleven lapped the circuit in seven minutes and six seconds – a time achieved “by combining the quickest sector times achieved during the fastest 2 laps.” Do note that said runs were conducted on an open circuit with traffic said to be “an inhibiting factor.”
“This was proven in the sector times set and I’m sure, with the track completely to itself, the car could push towards a seven minutes flat lap time,” said German race car driver, Marc Basseng. “It has been a hugely successful test for us in which we have thoroughly investigated areas of the car which are a specific focus for high performance driving,” added Lotus Motorsport technical manager, Gavan Kershaw.
The Lotus 3-Eleven will be available to customers in two trims – Road and Race. Said road-legal track weapon will arrive with only one seat sans roof and doors – though owners can option out a second seat for another occupant. Power comes from a supercharged 3.5 litre V6 engine with 450 hp and 450 Nm of torque. On the road-legal variant, a six-speed manual transmission sends power to the wheels.
Going for the Race model nets one a sequential gearbox instead. Dry weight is quoted at 900 kg for the race-spec variant which allows it to hit a top speed of 280 km/h. The road-going model has a higher top speed of 290 km/h while both models sprint from rest to 100 km/h in three seconds flat. The Road variant is priced at £82,000 (RM555,800) while the Race version goes for £115,200 (RM773,287).
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Lotus always a good trackday weapon,
but need good money to own it.
how exactly we can differentiate good vs bad money if we only receive donation? i don’t think it matters anyway, lotus gone into the over hardcore route and killing herself softly.
Why you dun talk about berseh too?
ohhsome track car
Lotus should CKD this model
Yes hopefully Lotus can give Rm1 billion profits to Proton.
Yes, I like that spirit. Nothing is impossible!
then the 7th gen Lotus Eleven will be Lotus 7-eleven????
if only i a millionair . I will buy this car, use it for track car.. 30- 40 years later sell it at car auction.. probably can get can make some profit cause rare car, wild design usually will appreciate in value..
If DRB were to restructure Proton,it may hive off this unprofitable stepchild,called Lotus…which is the WORST INVESTMENT decision taken by…thats history.
No point self syiok syiok tokok about its prowess,while it is bleeding Protong from every dollar it earns.
There are already layoffs at Naza,MAS,CIMB and now RHB offering Mutual separation schemes for its shivering staff who got big families to feed.
Only stupid,lazy, businessmen keep hanging on to a leech that is bleeding your company profusely.
Shambolic,is the word to describe Lotus.
Bad times/recession is on the horizon.Dont daydream things will improve .It is only getting worse by the day.LAZY….
Hmm… 7 minutes and 6 seconds?
Not bad for a 3.5 litre machine.
Nissan GT-R Nismo (2015) did it in 7:08.69
Lexus LFA Nürburgring Package did it in 7:14.64
Porsche 911 GT2 RS did it in 7:24
Ferrari 458 Italia did it in 7:32.92
Koenigsegg CCX did it in 7:33.6