The tiny British automaker with a funny name and a fast-as-hell car, McMurtry, is back. After wowing the world at Goodwood a couple of years ago, the tiny EV speed demon is back for another run at some record laps. This time the team brought a production-ready validation prototype out to Germany’s famed Hockenheimring to set some fast laps, and fast laps are what they did. With the car set to just 3/4 of its maximum power and sucker-fan downforce, the Spéirling became the fastest thing with fenders to ever run around that track.
The record before McMurtry showed up was held by Mercedes-AMG’s F1-inspired road car AMG One hypercar. The Spéirling’s lap time (with former F1 driver Max Chilton onboard) of one minute 24.43 seconds around the 2.842 mile track smashed the One’s time by a full 14 seconds. Not only that, but the tiny 1,000 horsepower EV set a lap time nearly four seconds faster than the DTM qualifying record at the track, set in 2022.
The fastest lap ever recorded at the Hockenheimring in its current configuration was set by Kimi Räikkönen’s McLaren MP4-19B Formula One car back in 2004 when he ran a one minute 13.780 second lap. If I were the folks at McMurtry, I would have cranked that prototype up to 110 percent and gone for the outright record. Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll end up in a barrier upside down on fire.
Every time the McMurtry hits a race track it manages to impress the hell out of me. I hope they keep shipping this little devil around the world and setting ever faster lap records with it. I think there is a Pikes Peak International Hill Climb record that could do with being challenged by this little guy.