Posted on Sunday 3 February 2008
The world’s fastest street-legal BMW isn’t some fancy sports coupe or slippery aerodynamic marvel. The vehicle is actually a sedan, albeit a highly modified M5 sedan. The record breaker is the G-Power Hurricane M5 sedan and it reached a top speed of 225mph (360km/h) during high speed testing at Germany’s Papenburg speedoval over the weekend.
Papenburg speedoval is a 12.3km loop with a 49.7 degree banked surface. The design means there are no side forces subjected to the car up to speeds of 250mph (402km/h). According to official testers, the car reached the speed whilst in 7th gear and was relying on a longer differential. Its maker claims the modified M5 could is good for over 250mph but poor weather conditions (slight rain and snow) on the day hampered further testing.
To reach these amazing speeds engineers developed a twin-supercharged version of the M5 V10, which puts out an insane 730hp (537kW). The previous record holder was the AC Schnitzer tuned Tension M6, which reached a top speed of just 206mph (332km/h).