The Fastest VARG Ever Made | Stark Files 032
This is the behind the scenes of how we took the outright lap record at the Autòdrom de Sitges Terramar, on an almost stock VARG SM.
Terramar is a banked oval just outside Barcelona that first opened in the 1920s, and it is the same track where we revealed the SM a year ago. The record we were chasing belonged to Carlos Sainz Sr, set in an Audi R8 at an average of 170 km/h with a top speed of 183. Going after that on an electric supermoto was never going to be simple.
The track has had no real maintenance in a hundred years, so the surface is breaking up. It runs twelve metres wide, yet the only line that holds real speed is about twenty centimetres of it. As standard the SM tops out near 154 km/h, so to have any chance at the record it needed to push close to 200. The one thing we changed was the sprockets. Everything else stayed stock, right down to running without a steering damper.
The first runs came up about a second short. The bike sat around 186 km/h and would not pull any harder, and for a while it looked like the whole project was finished. Instead of settling for close, Jonas went back out on a tighter and far rougher line that loaded the corners with much more force for the sake of a little more speed. The final lap was the scariest of them all, held flat through a corner where the front almost let go.
It was enough. Jonas crossed the line at 41.888 and the record was ours, quicker than a Le Mans car around a circuit built more than a century ago.
0:00 The Peril of a Century-Old Track
0:43 Mapping the Bumpy Path to Victory
2:39 Modifying the Machine for Maximum Velocity
5:09 The First Attempt at the Impossible
7:20 The Final Push for the Record
YOLO!
Um das Gesehene besser "einorden" zu können die alte Rekordfahrt (geht ab ca. 5:00 los)
It is unknown to many, including car lovers. The circuit of Terramar is the second oldest in Europe after Brooklands, ahead even to the legendary Le Mans, and the first in Spain. In this unique environment that still keeps the greatness it once had, two of the best riders of the moment, Carlos Sainz and Miguel Molina, tested their skills as drivers. The challenge: to overcome the rigors of the old track at the wheel of one of the fastest cars of the time (Audi R8 LSM).
