It doesn’t get much better than a performance driving machine on a scenic, twisting road. Ford knows that all too well, producing a series of videos on Europe’s greatest driving roads that culminated over a year ago. But it has at least one more up its sleeve.
This latest eleven-minute clip puts Steve Sutcliffe back behind the wheel, but not in a Mustang, Fiesta ST, or Focus RS. This time the Ford GT is the chariot of choice, and he’s driven it all the way to the arctic circle.
And not on just any old highway, either: Sutcliffe’s taken the bright yellow, black-striped supercar along Norway’s picturesque (but strictly governed) Atlantic Ocean Road – then north, north some more, and further north again to a little known track called the Arctic Circle Raceway… where it promptly set the lap record.
Norway’s largest, the circuit is the northernmost in the world, actually sitting several miles short of the circle itself (despite the name). It twists and turns along 2.3 miles of Norwegian hillside and looks like a track worth visiting, if only it weren’t so remote. At very least, it looks like you wouldn’t have to worry about overheating the engine (or the tires, or the brakes) in that climate.
Having raced competitively in the touring cars (and even showed well in an F1 test for Honda), Sutcliffe may very well have done the job himself. But for the record attempt, he handed the keys over to Stefan Mücke, one of Ford’s factory racing drivers (and winner of six FIA World Endurance Championship races) – who made quick business of breaking the lap record, and then breaking it again.
However, Wikipedia, we should note, suggests faster laps have been clocked on the track, Ford’s claim is ostensibly upheld by the times listed on FastestLaps.
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