After unveiling its 99X Electric race car back in August, Porsche decided to also show it off at the 2019 LA Auto Show before its official debut in the upcoming Formula E championship.
Racing will kick off in Diriyah, Saudi Arabia this upcoming weekend, with a total of 24 cars (12 teams) lining up on the grid. Now, if you’re not a racing enthusiast, rest assured that the purpose of the 99X Electric is quite multilateral.
The German automaker is planning to use the race car as a development platform for future production electric vehicles, so placing it alongside the Taycan in LA makes all the sense in the world.
Also read: Amazon Airs Documentary About BMW’s Formula E Team
While the chassis and battery are built according to Formula E regulations, the E-Performance powertrain certainly benefits from Porsche’s experience with LeMans. It produces up to 335 HP (340 PS), but is limited to 268 HP (272 PS) in Race Mode and 316 HP (320 PS) in Attack Mode. Top speed is 174 mph (280 km/h) and 0-62 mph (100 km/h) takes 2.8 seconds.
Compared to Formula 1, a Formula E car is nearly as quick off the line (on a good day), but considerably slower with regards to top speed.
As far as its aesthetics are concerned, the 99X Electric features a traditional red, black and white Porsche Motorsport livery, with multiple sponsor decals from the likes of Vodafone, Hugo Boss, TAG Heuer, Puma and a few others.
Driving the cars this season will be Formula E veteran Andre Lotterer (formerly with DS Techeetah) and Neel Jani.
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