2021 Porsche Panamera breaks Nurburgring lap record
The upcoming 2021 Porsche Panamera has broken the Nürburgring Nordschleife lap record in the “executive cars” category.
The iconic 20.832km circuit in central Germany – used as a testing benchmark by global vehicle manufacturers – was lapped in 7 minutes 29.81 seconds by German test driver Lars Kern.
Kern started the lap at 1:49pm on 24 July, 2020, with an outside temperature of 22 degrees Celsius and a track temperature of 34 degrees Celsius.
The previous lap record in the “executive cars” class was held by a Mercedes-Benz AMG GT 63 S, driven by Demian Schaffert in 2018.
The AMG lapped the Nordschleife in 7 minutes 30.11 seconds – 0.3 seconds slower than the latest Panamera run.
Last month the new Porsche Panamera had been spied at the Nürburgring, and rumours at the time suggested that a record run had been attempted.
Few other details were provided, however the latest announcement from Porsche confirms this run took place.
In 2016 Lars Kern set a time of 7:38.46 minutes driving the previous generation Panamera Turbo, however the track layout was 200 metres shorter at the time.
Accounting for the extra distance, Porsche estimates the most recent run was approximately 13 seconds quicker.
In 2018 a Lamborghini Aventador broke the outright production lap record at the track with a time of 6:44.97 minutes.
The 2021 Panamera is scheduled to make its official debut later this month.
Watch the highlight video below.