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McLaren P1 Drag Races Ferrari F40, Performance Gap Is Huge

In many segments, cars have stopped getting faster from one generation to another, as safety and efficiency are far more important. That's not true for supercars, as proven by this drag race between a McLaren P1 and a Ferrari F40.
McLaren P1 Drag Races Ferrari F40, Performance Gap Is Huge 5 photos
Photo: Lovecars/YouTube screenshot
McLaren P1 Drag Races Ferrari F40, Performance Gap Is HugeMcLaren P1 Drag Races Ferrari F40, Performance Gap Is HugeMcLaren P1 Drag Races Ferrari F40, Performance Gap Is HugeMcLaren P1 Drag Races Ferrari F40, Performance Gap Is Huge
Why? Why not? We know there's nothing to be learned from such drag races. The Ferrari F40 was built before the era of constant drag racing for the sake of entertaining the internet. It's not slow, but you really need to see how big the gap between generations of exotics has become.

The F40 is one of the most iconic supercar shapes of all time. A child of the late 1980s, it came out the same year as Walk Like an Egyptian by The Bangles or I Wanna Dance with Somebody by Whitney Houston. The engine was amazing for the day, a 2.9-liter twin-turbo V8 officially rated at 478 horsepower (real output might be around 500 hp).

The fastest car in the world at the time of its launch, the F40 can hit 201 miles per hour. But being a dinosaur from three decades ago, the classic Ferrari is a more analog experience that requires changing gears. Meanwhile, the McLaren P1 uses its own twin-turbo V8, a 3.8-liter which makes over 900 horsepower in combination with some electric witchcraft.

We knew the P1 was going to smash the F40, but we weren't prepared for the massive gap that got revealed in this Lovecars drag race video. The driver of the Ferrari knows he's going to lose but seems very happy to be drag racing such a rare car.

Meanwhile, Tiff Needell seems to be satisfied with being in the faster modern supercar. Perhaps he's a little salty after losing so many races in that BMW M2 CS. Seeing just how hard the P1 smashed its opponent off the line, he decides to let off the gas and let the Ferrari have a moral victory. But at the last moment, he puts the McLaren back into full attack mode for an easy victory.

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About the author: Mihnea Radu
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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.
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