{"id":2241597,"date":"2026-11-06T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-11-05T21:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2241597"},"modified":"2026-11-06T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-11-05T21:00:00","slug":"hold-onto-your-hats-the-2978bhp-yangwang-u9-xtreme-just-hit-312-65mph","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2241597","title":{"rendered":"Hold onto your hats: the 2,978bhp Yangwang U9 Xtreme just hit 312.65mph*"},"content":{"rendered":"
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There are quick EVs, fast ones, and then there’s whatever you wanna call this Yangwang U9 Xtreme. BYD’s mad, four-motor hypercar has just recorded a claimed 503.17km\/h (312.65mph), becoming the first production car to break through the 500km\/h barrier.<\/p>\n

The run took place on a closed section of the Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed International Road (E11) in Abu Dhabi on 1 November. A 10km stretch of road was shut down for the attempt, including a 7km straight used for the top-speed run.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Two runs on the previous day peaked at 490km\/h (304mph), but a bit of tinkering, tweaking and tyre-kicking from Yangwang’s engineers overnight led to the magic 500km\/h+ figure the following day.<\/p>\n

The record-breaking U9 Xtreme was a heavily modified version of the standard 1,252bhp U9, with four upgraded electric motors producing 2,978bhp and a staggering 1,200bhp-per-tonne power-to-weight ratio.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Behind the wheel of said monster was endurance racer Marc Basseng – a man of solid constitution, clearly – who also piloted the U9 Xtreme during its previous record run in Germany where it reached 496.22km\/h (308.33mph).<\/p>\n

Yangwang says the run secured two Guinness World Records: the highest speed achieved by a production car in a single-direction run, and the highest speed achieved by an electric production car in a single-direction run.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The important wording there is single-direction run<\/em>. That adds a degree of controversy to the record, because a bidirectional run is often used in speed record attempts to eliminate any environmental and physical variables that may artificially inflate a one-way speed, such as wind, road gradient and surface conditions.<\/p>\n

Bugatti faced similar criticism after the Chiron’s 304mph run, and it also means the SSC Tuatara retains the recognised two-way production-car speed record, hitting an average speed of 282.9mph.<\/p>\n

Still, whether you consider it the definitive production-car benchmark or not, there’s no arguing with one thing: 312.65mph is absurdly fast.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There are quick EVs, fast ones, and then there’s whatever you wanna call this Yangwang U9 Xtreme. BYD’s mad, four-motor hypercar has just recorded a claimed 503.17km\/h (312.65mph), becoming the first production car to break through the 500km\/h barrier. The run took place on a closed section of the Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed International Road […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[226,237],"class_list":["post-2241597","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-crawlmanager","tag-topgear-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2241597","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2241597"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2241597\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2241597"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2241597"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2241597"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}