The 2020 Tesla Roadster and Elon Musk’s Need for Speed

Whether it’s sports cars, rockets, or tweets, there’s no denying that Elon Musk likes to push limits. That trait has been evident in all his companies’ pursuits.

We saw it early with the original Tesla Roadster. When the car debuted in 2008 it managed to produce a 0-60 mph time of just 4.6 seconds from an all-electric car. Within three years, Tesla shaved nearly a full second off that time with the Roadster 2.5, clocking a 0-60 of 3.7 seconds. That time was competitive with cars like the Lexus LF-A, Mercedes SLS AMG and the Porsche GT-3 RS. Still, it trailed the fastest production car at the time by a full second. The Bugatti Veyron sprinted to 60 mph in a blistering 2.5 seconds.

Fast forward to November 2017 when the second generation Tesla Roadster emerged from the back of a Tesla Semi trailer to surprise the crowd. Musk said the car would be the fastest production car ever.


The prototype is said to do 0-60 mph in 1.9 seconds – the first car ever to break the 2-second mark.

Why?

“The point of doing this is to just give a hardcore smackdown to gasoline cars,” Musk said. “Driving a gasoline sports car is going to feel like a steam engine with a side of quiche.”

The Numbers Are Real

Emile Bouret, a college roommate of Tesla Chief Designer Franz von Holzhausen, is a professional driver who has had the opportunity to pilot the Roadster. He says the numbers Musk touted might actually be conservative.

“I think I can say without getting in trouble that those are actual figures,” he said in a video posted to YouTube.

“Those aren’t theoretical,” Bouret said. “Those aren’t calculations. We’ve done those numbers. And I probably shouldn’t say that those numbers are even conservative, but they are. That thing is going to be a proper weapon.”

Smackdown Challenge Accepted

It wasn’t just the crowd in Hawthorne, Calif. that was surprised by the Roadster and its crazy performance numbers.

“We kind of had our future mapped out, and then we heard about the new Tesla Roadster and its insane acceleration numbers, and we thought ‘damn, that’s put the gauntlet down,'” Christian von Koenigsegg told Top Gear. “We thought, ‘this is not okay.'”

Koenigsegg holds the current record for world’s fastest car. A Koenigsegg Agera RS driven by factory driver, Niklas Lilja, achieved five new world records for a production vehicle on November 4th, 2017. The Agera RS has 5.0-liter twin-turbo V-8 pushing more 1160 horsepower.

Interestingly, Koenigsegg has been inspired by Tesla for a few years. He purchased a Tesla Model S P85+ in 2013 and was wowed by the car’s instant power. He noted that it was an achievement that a Formula One car could not attain with a traditional internal combustion engine. He decided a combination of a traditional internal combustion engine and electric powertrain would make for an impressively powerful supercar. And the Koenigsegg Regera was born – a limited production, plug-in hybrid sports car that can hit 60 mph in 2.7 seconds.


But, news of the updated Tesla Roadster’s performance sent Koenigsegg’s engineers into a state of agitation.

“We wondered whether it was possible, and yeah, it’s possible,” Koenigsegg said in the Top Gear interview. “Then we thought, ‘okay how do we deal with it? This is embarrassing.’ In two days we’d thought of a few things. The simplest way of putting it is like this: It’s combining direct drive with the hybridization we have in a different format with Freevalve engine technology, in a peculiar layout.”

Koenigsegg now believes his cars can achieve more. “We’re talking 0 to 250 mph in 14 seconds or something like this,” he said.

Tesla Can Go Faster Too

Let’s take another look the specs for the next-gen Roadster:

  • 7,376 pound-feet of torque
  • 0-60 mph in 1.9 seconds
  • 0-100 mph in 4.2 seconds
  • Quarter mile in 8.8 seconds
  • 250+ mph top speed
  • 620 miles of highway range

Those insane performance numbers Tesla has touted that are driving supercar builders into a tizzy? Those are for the base version of the car.

Musk has said a performance version of the car will have a “SpaceX option” that includes 10 small rocket thrusters arranged seamlessly around the car.

“These rocket engines dramatically improve acceleration, top speed, braking & cornering. Maybe they will even allow a Tesla to fly…” Musk said in a tweet.

It sounds like a joke, but when pressed for details by a Twitter follower, Musk was happy to elaborate.

“Using the config you describe, plus an electric pump to replenish air in COPV, when car power draw drops below max pack power output, makes sense,” he said. “But we are going to go a lot further.”

You’re going to go “further” than 10 rocket thrusters? Better buckle up.

Is All This Really Necessary?

The next-gen Tesla Roadster is slated to start production in 2020. Prices for the Roadster will start at $200,000, with a required deposit of $50,000. A limited edition Founders Series of the car will cost $250,000 and will have to be paid for up front and in full.

Compared to the $1.9 million for the Koenigsegg Regera, the Roadster seems like a complete bargain for those with a need for speed.

Still, there are few roads or scenarios where accelerating to 60 mph in less than 2 seconds seems reasonable. And, sure, we’ve all been late to an event before and wished we could hit 250 mph in our car, but most will probably agree that level of performance is best left to the professionals. Is 0-60 mph in less than 2 seconds even safe for your average Joe? Can you imagine gripping the steering wheel of your Tesla as it climbs beyond 150…200…250 mph?

Can you imagine your Tesla having rocket boosters? Can you imagine your Tesla flying?

Obviously, that’s not Musk’s point.

He wants us – and all automakers – to imagine a world that doesn’t run on gas. He wants to push the limit. And, he wants to get there as fast as possible.

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