Hennessey Wants To Hit 300 MPH With The 1600 HP Venom F5

Hennessey Performance has set an ambitious goal of pushing its Venom F5 hypercar to 300 mph (482 km/h) next year.

Unveiled at SEMA last year with blacked-out windows and a yet-to-be-finished interior, the Venom F5 is the Texas tuner’s first production vehicle built from the ground up.

During a comprehensive interview with Automobile Magazine, John Hennessey said the company will build a fully-functional example to set a top speed record before production of the Venom F5 starts in earnest in late 2019.

“Our big, hairy, audacious goal is 300 mph. When we accomplish one goal, we look for the next mountain to climb, and so the real big mountain for us was to design, develop, and build our own bespoke car.

“We’ve been doing this for 27, 28 years. We’re known for going fast, and I was like, “Okay. We beat Bugatti back in 2014 with the Venom GT. What’s the next big number? What’s the next big goal to go for?”, Hennessey explained.

Hennessey is chasing world domination

According to John Hennessey, the company didn’t design the Venom F5 from the outset to specifically hit 300 mph. Instead, that incredible figure only came into the conversation after a coefficient of drag analysis determined that the sleek hypercar has a 0.33 drag coefficient, significantly better than the 0.44 of the original Venom GT.

“The engineers did the math and said, ‘If we can manage the loading on the tires, which we think we can, the car [with 1,600 hp] should exceed 300 mph.'”

When the Hennessey Venom F5 reaches the production line, it will come with an 8.0-liter twin-turbo V8 delivering 1600 hp and 1300 lb-ft of torque. The hypercar will also weigh less than 3000 lbs (1360 kg).