I did a little work on the Slashgear YouTube video shot at the launch of P85D. Acceleration is indeed insane. Presumably there were at least 3 people in the car (movie is shot from the back seat). 0-60 is ~3.7 sec. You are also at illegal residential speed in 1.5 seconds. They hit 50 mph before entering the tunnel Here is the graph
Probably the extra mass in the back seat. I'll bet the quoted 3.2 seconds is with a skinny driver alone ;-)
With a nearly 5000 pound car, it'd take a lot of mass in the rear seat to throw the numbers off that far, but I don't have an alternate explanation (though as others have noted there are a few possibilities.) I'll be interested to see what independent instrumented testing shows - historically Tesla has underrated their cars. Walter
Not sure if this "embed post" will work, but The Verge posted another video of a test ride where the driver told the passengers (after reminding them to press their heads back against the headrest before launch) that with 3 people in the car 0-60 would be about 3.6 seconds. Clearly this is something Tesla had already worked out. Watch the video on their page: This is Teslas D: an all-wheel-drive Model S with eyes on the road | The Verge
I definitely notice a hit to acceleration in my MS60 as I add each additional adult. I wonder if the 3.2 sec being the official figure from Tesla means that in reality it could be even less than that (with no passengers), as we've seen with the other cars. Hasn't Tesla been found to publish conservative 0-60 times compared to real world measurements? Maybe in reality it is a sub 3 second car. Yikes!!!
And that's undoubtedly 3 _passengers_ in the car, for a total of 4 people in those test drives. They had a lot of people at the event and would have been loading them full.
The mass definitely makes a difference. By myself, I can spin the P85 tires every time from a dead stop, even without fully flooring it. When I've got 5 people in the car, they don't spin at all even when I smash the pedal all the way down immediately.
With Tesla's numbers typically being a bit conservative (I think I heard they use performance at 50% SOC) and word of a sub three-second test car well before the D announcement, it wouldn't surprise me.
Anything below 3.0 seconds with a driver and road-legal tire setup would be amazing. An actual 2.7 second run would be mind boggling. Not possible IMO. The difference between 3.2 and 2.7 is like the difference between running a 100 m dash at 11 seconds blank (you're fast and can compete) vs 9.5 seconds (you can win an olympic gold medal).
The source is from Tesla sales personnel, though I wouldn't be surprised if it were a professional on a track with non-stock rubber.
Model S is bigger, of course, but the Nissan GTR reportedly managed it: Nissan GT-R 0-60 Times - 0-60 Specs
A professional and a track wouldn't make much difference - press the pedal and go. (Except track often have good surface, but so do many regular roads). Driver weight would mean something and optimal tires - likely 19" and quite narrow with a very sticky rubber mix would be important. Also very important is absolute 100% charge and a cold drive train (first run is typically fastest, however tires should be warmed up somehow). Then there's the whole methodolgy question: roll out or not? The Tesla does better vs. ICE if you measure with roll out (no penalty for roll out like and ICE that does relatively better from stand still due to built up torque in the drivevtrain being unleashed as the clutch engages).
The track was a concession to your assertion that it couldn't be done on street-legal tires. IIRC, there is an AMS GTR one-off that has done 1.9 seconds. Addendum: 1.69s, but who's counting Nissan GTR alpha 12 0-60 in 1.69 sec - YouTube
Just to clarify my "not possible IMO" statement: I was not referring to cars in general but to the P85D running a 2.7 (on any tires). But I hope I'm wrong!