Crazy Eights

C

A. (Previous pages)

Driven at a moderate pace on a public road, the nearly 2000-hp

Nevera feels remarkably unremarkable. B. A simple press of the right pedal will instantly clear the

Nevera’s mirrors of any following cars. C. Somehow it seems like the Nevera’s features should be controlled by holograms or telepathy instead of knobs and switches. D. Virtually no one will pronounce the name

Rimac properly. E. With its mid-engine proportions and butterfly doors, the

Nevera looks basically like any other supercar. But it’s much stranger, and quicker, than them.

D EIGHT-POINT-FIVE SECONDS. That’s how long the Rimac Nevera electric hypercar takes to run the quarter-mile. It’s six-tenths quicker than the Bugatti Chiron Super Sport. And at the end of those 1320 feet, the Nevera is traveling 161 mph, according to Rimac. And the Nevera will do it over and over, 30 times on a single charge, on regular old Michelin tires, on the street.

In those old-timey days when cars had wheels made of wood, headlamps made of brass, and roofs made of air, some believed a driver’s face might melt off at over 100 mph. With the benefit of hindsight, and thanks to the low-tech and underappreciated windshield, it’s clear the 100mph barrier was no real barrier. Now, when you’re going very, very fast in a car without a windshield, as Jeremy Clarkson learned in a notorious 2007 Top Gear segment on the Ariel Atom, your face does flap like Silly Putty, making for excellent television. But with a windshield? Facial structure is safe. Or so I thought.

With my right foot pinned to the floor, I released my left foot from the Nevera’s brake, the car hurtling past 60 mph in 1.9 seconds and not remotely letting up. My face changed shape with cheeks pulled back taut, eyeballs knocked against my brain, and blood rushed rearward inside a well-appointed, virtually silent cockpit with the automatic temperature control set to a pleasant 71 degrees. I experienced extreme tunnel vision and could focus only on one urgent task: figuring out how much road I had left in order to avoid a massive crash. Deep into the triple digits, I developed a headache and mild vertigo. Then I made a U-turn and repeated the process twice more. This much electricity is a hell of a drug.

Like most deeply antisocial behavior, exercising nearly 2000 instantaneously available horsepower is physically uncomfortable, instantly addictive, and easy to normalize. Rimac’s people told me the horsepower—there are 1914 ponies, accompanied by 1741 lb-ft of torque—is the least interesting part of the car. That’s difficult to believe. Fortunately, though, it’s not the only interesting part of the car. Rimac also does other

A. Rimac nails ergonomics and build quality in a way Tesla is still incapable of doing. B. The company will build only 150 of these $2 million battery-electric hypercars. C. You may ask yourself,

“Why has my face melted?” The answer is the Nevera’s highly antisocial accelerative force. D. The Nevera’s pursed lips and squinty eyes imply that it disapproves of something. things staggeringly well for a company so new that you are almost certainly pronouncing its name wrong (it’s REE-mats).

Build quality is excellent, with tight tolerances between every panel. The materials, paint luster, and overall completeness of the vehicle belie the fact that almost every part is done in-house in Croatia. Tesla has been building the Model S for over a decade now in California using Mercedes switchgear and doesn’t even come close. Though there are some suppliers for things like HVAC fans, Rimac handles the complete powertrain, the entire body, the chassis, and everything the driver touches, uses, or engages with. There are well-considered buttons for primary functions, as well as responsive anti-glare touchscreens for secondary settings, media, and navigation. It’s all intuitive, comfortable, even sumptuous.

Have I mentioned it runs eights?

The ride is brilliant in Comfort and Sport modes, thanks to an incredibly rigid carbon monocoque paired with an electronically adjustable suspension. While this is no GT4 RS, the handling is more than appropriate given the grand-touring mission statement, and it masks the more than 5000-pound curb weight well. The pizza-platter ceramic brakes, controlled entirely by-wire, are grabby at low speeds. Then I bombed a corner nearly 100 mph faster than I ever have in a regular sports car. I can accept a bit of lowspeed grabbiness for such high-speed effectiveness. Fortunately, the regenerative braking is effective enough that I didn’t need the brake pedal except for very aggressive stops.

The thing about electric vehicles is that at 10 percent throttle, they all feel the same. My Ferrari 328 at 10 percent throttle feels completely different from my BMW M3 at 10 percent throttle, which feels completely different from my wife’s Nissan Pao at 10 percent throttle. Internalcombustion engines give a car personality. Power is good and so is speed, but you don’t need either of them to discern the character of an engine. A small V-8 is different from an inline-six, which is different from a four. Even going slowly, a Ferrari’s got the fizz.

At light throttle, all EV motors are the same regardless of peak power output. So in traffic, in the city, there is nothing to remind you that the cage-free Nevera is quick enough to be banned from most U.S. drag strips after one pass. It’s not exciting to cruise in, but on the flip side, the Nevera is usable in the way a Pro Stock dragster is not. It’s no harder to drive than a Tesla Model 3. You give up nothing for all of that thrust. But unless you’re hurtling down the road so fast that the earth’s curvature is an issue, you’re not getting anything for all of those dollars either. To get your money’s worth, you have to rent runways or show absolute unabashed contempt for your state’s vehicle code.

Mate Rimac, the 34-year-old CEO and founder of the company (who is so good at his job, he’s now also the CEO of Bugatti), is a pragmatist who understands perfectly well that his untethered

B C

D

roller coasters won’t save the planet. His personal collection includes a swath of the most engaging driver’s cars ever produced, including BMW M3s, an M5, a Ferrari 812, and Porsche 911s. “If you want to do your part to save the planet, you’d make more of an impact by not eating meat than you would by switching to an electric car, ” he tells me. “But I was so impressed with the power delivery of the EV, and the packaging of the motors compared to a huge petrol engine, that I saw it as the future of the ultrahigh-performance car. ” (Again, the first production car bearing this man’s name comfortably runs eights.)

Porsche, Bugatti, and several other NDAprotected OEMs agree and are now in the Mate Rimac business. But his dream cars are still gas powered. He wants a Carrera GT, a Ferrari F50, and a McLaren F1. A man after my own heart.

And he isn’t wrong, on any count. The Nevera is so stupendously rapid, I conclude that all OEMs need to stop chasing metrics with gasoline. Just give up now. If you want to build the quickest supercars around, electric is the only way forward. But that doesn’t mean dumping internal combustion entirely. It just means a shift in perspective: Chase numbers with electricity and emotion with fuel.

If enough daily drivers and face-melting supercars abandon combustion, maybe there will be enough environmental credits left to continue with stick-shift wonders like the Porsche GT3? Maybe even bring back a few from the dead?

Miro “Mrgud” Zrnčević, Rimac’s full-time test driver, confirmed to my molten face what I already knew: You acclimate to almost 2000 hp quickly, at which point the novelty wears off and you crave more. When it’s this effortless, seeking more is a slippery, never-ending slope. But engagement is forever, even when the car is no longer the fastest thing around, let alone comparatively competitive (see: Ferrari F355).

At the helm of the ship taking us into the realm of eight-second daily-drivable hypercars is a person who drives stick on the weekends. The future is safely in good and fanatical hands.

B

C A. The Nevera started life back in 2018 as the Rimac C _ Two concept car. B. This is where the internal-combustion engine would have been mounted. C. At more than two and a half tons, this carbon-fiber hypercar is heavier than a loaded Jeep Grand

Cherokee.

SPECIFICATIONS 2022 Rimac Nevera

PRICE: $1,965,000 (est)

POWERTRAIN: 4 electric motors

OUTPUT: 1914 hp 1741 lb-ft

TRANSMISSIONS: direct-drive