With today’s official introduction of the production Porsche 918, PorschePorscheGermany, 1931 > present43 models
4639 photos
29 videos
has announced that the 918 has set a new production car lap record at the Nürburgring Nordschleife with the blisteringly fast time of 6 minutes and 57 seconds. Porsche factory race driver Marc Lieb drove the car during the record lap.

"We promised a great deal with the 918 Spyder, namely to redefine driving pleasure, efficiency and performance. We have kept our word,” said Wolfgang Hatz, Porsche head of research and development.

Porsche had Walter Röhrl, factory test driver Timo Kluck and race driver Marc Lieb all complete laps on September 4. The cars all had the optional Weissach Package that lowers weight. Lieb did the 6:57 lap time on his first lap, but Porsche says that all of them beat the previous production car lap record of 7:11.57 set by a Gumpert Apollo SportGumpert Apollo SportGermany, 2007 > present14 photos
in 2009. A 6:57 lap around the 20.6km-long Nordschleife works out to an average speed of 111mph (179.5km/h).

For perspective, the Porsche’s time was a second faster than a Ferrari 599XXFerrari 599XXItaly, 2009 > 20103 photos
and two seconds slower than a Radical SR8Radical SR8 RXUnited Kingdom, 2011 > present4 photos
.

The plug-in hybrid 918 has a combined output of 887hp from its 4.6-liter V8 and electric motors on the front and rear axle. It will hit 100km/h in 2.8 seconds and consumes between 3.0l/100km and 3.3l/100km and CO2 emissions between 70g/km of CO2 and 79g/km of CO2.