It's Monday Morning - Here's the top 10 Hypercars of 2024
Here’s our top 10 performance paragons, each one pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in the pursuit of performance.
Each one is a high octane thrill ride that’ll have no doubt broken the speed odd record as it stakes its claim on a place in the automotive hall of fame.
When it comes to design philosophy, it would be best to describe the Aston Martin Valkyrie as ‘uncompromising’. The brainchild of Red Bull F1 technical director and all-round aerodynamic genius, Adrian Newey, the jaw-dropping British machine has been created to deliver the ultimate in outright performance, with nothing coming between it and its lap times-smashing goal.
With a 1876bhp on tap, true hypercar pace was never going to be a problem for the Pininfarina Battista, even when you consider that this carbonfibre-hulled machine tips the scales at a not inconsiderable 2200kg. Essentially a reskinned Rimac Nevera, the Battista is one of the first of an all-new generation of high-performance electric cars that have their eyes firmly focused on a future where the internal combustion engine is put out to pasture. The car's raw statistics certainly make for startling reading, with a 0-62mph taking less than 2sec and 186mph coming up after only 12sec
3. Lotus Evija
If you were in any doubt about which way the high performance wind was blowing, then the appearance of two EVs in our hypercar top 10 should leave you in no doubt. We love high-revving, noisy, fast and dramatic combustion-engined machines, but the appeal of instant, walloping, vectored-per-corner torque isn’t hard to deny - and the Lotus Evija serves that up in spades.
Where the Veyron used aluminium spaceframe construction, the Chiron has a lighter carbonfibre monocoque. Where the Veyron stopped short of 1200bhp in its final forms, the Chiron ups that to nearly 1500bhp.
Where the Veyron left Bugatti's top speed yardstick at 268mph, the Chiron has, in 1578bhp Super Sport form, taken what has become an increasingly highly contested world production car speed record up beyond the 300mph marker, where it currently rests at 304.7mph.
The Senna is a car of truly astonishing track abilities. Even though its not the most powerful car to have lapped our dry handling circuit, it has such phenomenal reserves of grip that it smashed our dry-handling track lap record by fully a second-and-a-half when we road-tested it in 2018. Developing some 800kg of downforce at its peak, and with a growling V8 of just under 800bhp, it's a car you expect to be a nerve-testing challenge on track and almost impossible to drive on the road. The simple fact is that neither is true.
Ferrari's top-of-the-tree hypercar is nothing less than the greatest and most sensational peak that the performance car has ever reached. Powered by an incredible, spine-tingling, naturally aspirated, 789bhp 6.3-litre V12 assisted by 161bhp of electric power channelled direct to the rear wheels, the LaFerrari's powertrain makes an incredible 950bhp all told.
Although we never got the chance to strap our timing gear to one, Ferrari claims the car hurls itself from 0-62mph in just 2.4sec and to 186mph in just 15sec.
7. McLaren P1
McLaren's first Ultimate Series car had to follow in the footsteps of the firm's legendary and celebrated F1, which built the company a worldwide reputation all by itself. McLaren resisted the temptation to make the P1 a modern facsimile of the F1, however, instead having a 903bhp hybrid-electric powertrain, a two-seat interior, state-of-the-art suspension technology, lightweight construction and competition-grade aerodynamics to deliver the fastest, most focused and most exciting performance car it could imagine, fit for equally unprecedented thrills on both road and track.
This car can be driven for around 15 miles on electric power alone and then charged up at home to do it all again. In time-honoured Porsche supercar type, it's little harder to drive than the 718 Boxster – and it's a convertible.
But it also has a motorsport-derived normally aspirated V8 engine that revs to almost 9000rpm and makes the car both raw and exciting in full-bore mode. There's four-wheel drive, too, and more than 900lb ft of torque, making the 918 Spyder accelerate from rest with true savagery.
Driven by a twin-turbocharged 6.0-litre V12 from Mercedes-AMG, the Huayra did indeed prove itself to be a physically challenging driver's car from the old-school, with handling demanding respect and every shred of your concentration if you dared disable the stability aids.
But it's beautifully communicative and honest, too, and so rich, immersive and special to drive at almost any speed as to be totally intoxicating.
With its wild looks and brain-spinning 1177bhp power output, the Zenvo certainly packs the raw statistics to be considered a true hypercar. Yet it's the car's unique tilting rear wing that attracts all the headlines, lifting at either end when cornering to help reduce body roll and boot grip. Either way, this daring Danish (yes, really) machine is a fairly exciting steer, its twin-supercharged 5.8-litre V8 delivering 0-124mph in 6.8sec (around the same time as a McLaren Senna, should you ask). It also drives the rear wheels through a motorsport-style seven-speed sequential transmission complete with straight-cut gears, which is great for reduced power loss but less so for refinement.
Blog Credit
METAL BOX VEHICLE REMARKETING LIMITED No: 12601724
17 Mill Meadows Lane, Filey, England, YO14 0FA
