Shortly after Koenigsegg smashed the top speed record for a production car, John Hennessey said the Swedish firm’s achievement has motivated him to reclaim the record with the Venom F5.
Speaking with Top Gear, Hennessey stated he was initially skeptical after hearing about Koenigsegg’s record average speed.
“My first thought was ‘did they run both directions?’, because that’s a question everybody asks us. Then I wondered if they’d brought proper Racelogic VBOX equipment to validate the data. I later heard that they did. So once I saw the official news come out on Instagram and then YouTube, I looked at it and I thought they did it right. And fair play to them,” he said.
“I’m not worried about it [Koenigsegg’s speed], I’m excited and motivated. I’ve been waiting almost four years for somebody to better the record. And once you have more players that are playing in the top speed game, then you have more relevance.”
As development of the new Venom F5 is only in its early stages, the Texas tuner isn’t yet in a position to challenge the 277.8 mph two-way average set by the Agera RS. Instead, Hennessey said he will let Bugatti and Koenigsegg fight each other for the title of world’s fastest production car for a while.
“It all puts pressure on Bugatti, to step up and deliver the number that everybody expects them to do. Then we’ll let those guys duke it out for a little while, then, once we figure out which one of those guys [Koenigsegg and Bugatti] is going the fastest, then we’ll take the F5 out and lay down a number.”
On paper, the Venom F5 has the potential to rival both the 1,360 hp Agera RS and 1,500 hp Chiron. Powering the new American hypercar is a twin-turbo V8 with 1,600 hp. When combined with a curb weight of just 2,950 lbs (1,338 kg), the car will apparently hit 186 mph (300 km/h) in under 10 seconds and potentially, reach 300 mph (482 km/h).
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