Ahead of this weekend’s big Le Mans race, Audi has released a promo video for the R8 LMX, their first production car with laser headlights. In it, Tom Kristensen takes us around the finer details of the car and its likeness to the racing machines he usually pilots.
For those of you who aren’t familiar with him, Kristensen is a Danish pilot currently with Audi Sport Team Joest. His most notable achievement is winning the 24 Hour of Le Mans nine times in total, six of his victories being in a row.
Mr Le Mans, as he’s nicknamed, likes the Ara Blue paint and all the other cool details on the R8, which came from Audi’s personalization program. The LMX is also technically the fastest Audi around, thanks to a 5.2-liter V10 that’s been cranked up to 570 hp and 540 Nm (398 lb-ft) of torque. Lamborghini Gallardo levels of power mean 0 to 100 km/h takes just 3.4 seconds and the top speed is a frightening 320 km/h (199 mph).
Marketing the R8 LMX has been nothing short of an embarrassment for Audi, though. First, the company officially announced this car was going to be the first production car with laser lights, ahead of the BMW i8. The Bavarians then put a rush order on the i8 and rolled out their car first, as it should have been all along, forcing Audi to now claim the R8 LMX is the fastest car in the world with laser headlights.
All that makes this a hard car to like, but if we look at it as the ultimate R8 ever, fitted with racing technology and built in strictly limited numbers, it becomes a lot more “palatable”. And it needs to be, since Audi are asking all 99 customers to pay at least €210,000 for this Star Wars tech on wheels.
Mihnea's favorite cars have already been built, the so-called modern classics from the '80s and '90s. He also loves local car culture from all over the world, so don't be surprised to see him getting excited about weird Japanese imports, low-rider VWs out of Germany, replicas from Russia or LS swaps down in Florida. Full profile
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