Perhaps we’re collectively enamored with the Porsche 918 Spyder since it so radically defies convention. We’ve been led to believe that hybrids are slow and lumbering, overweight and stripped of all driving pleasure, yet the Porsche 918 flaunts both its eco-sensitivity and its supercar performance credentials like no other car on the planet.
If you need proof of the car’s performance capabilities, look no further than its recent lap of the Nürburgring Nordschleife in 7:14. Almost as impressive was jaded moto-journalist Chris Harris’ Christmas-morning-like-glee in riding shotgun, at the hands of Porsche chassis engineer Holger Bartels.
Frankly, we’re even more impressed with two-time world rally champion Walter Röhrl’s take on the car than we are with its Nürburgring lap time. After a brief stint behind the wheel, Röhrl said the Porsche 918 “defies physics,” adding, “how it pulls itself out of corners in simply surreal.”
When Walter Röhrl says that a car defies physics and calls its handling surreal, we have a moral obligation to bring you that footage. Enjoy.