Jaguar has just revealed the all-wheel drive version of its F-Type sports car, while at the same time announcing its partnership with The Bloodhound (land speed record attempt) Project. The AWD F-Type will be used as a radio/backup vehicle when the Bloodhound team will attempt to break the world land speed record – they want to push it above 1,000 mph or 1,609 km/h.
They’ve already gone ahead and tested the F-Type’s capabilities as a support vehicle, though in place of the record breaking car, they used jet fighter flown at 500 mph or 804 km/h. The Jag was also driven flat out, reaching its limited top speed of 186 mph or 320 km/h during the test run held on the Hakskeen Pan desert in the Northern Cape of South Africa.
No technical details were provided, though, other than the claimed to top speed and acceleration time to sixty, which is 3.9 seconds for the R Coupe model.
The fully updated F-Type range (including the awd) will debut on November 19 at the LA Auto Show. It’s an important date for the car, since the number of variants on offer will grow from the current six to fourteen.
If you have doubts about the F-Type going down the extra traction route, Ian Hoban, Jaguar’s Vehicle Line Director assures us that their aim “with engineering the all-wheel drive F-TYPE was to maintain the engaging rear-drive character that’s so important to Jaguar sports cars, yet offer even greater dynamic capability. The result is a controllable, exploitable and blisteringly fast performance car in all weather and road conditions.”
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