Bugatti invited some of its owners out to the Kennedy Space Center to experience how fast their cars really are.
Officially, Bugatti was using the three-mile (4.8 km) runway in Florida to do some straight-line aerodynamic testing. However, since it had access to the long, flat stretch of tarmac, it thought it might as well invite some Chiron owners to the location.
“Just a few years ago achieving 400 km/h required months of careful preparation, the very best motorsport drivers and the most favorable conditions,” said Christophe Piochon, president of Bugatti Automobiles. “But today, in the world of our meticulously engineered and designed Bugatti hyper sports cars, we opened up this performance to our customers in absolute safety and allow them something that very few people will ever have, and most of them even had a chance to experience this with their own car.”
Read: McLaren Speedtail Hits 250 MPH At Kennedy Space Center
Although the drivers didn’t need a lifetime of experience to achieve the speed, they weren’t sent out onto the runway without any guidance. Before attempting their top-speed runs, they were given some tips from a Bugatti test driver.
At 250 mph (402 km/h) drivers are covering roughly the length of a football field every second. In getting there, they experience 1G of longitudinal force. And once they’re racing along at high speed, they need to allow the Chiron to wander back and forth along the track, rather than attempting to fight it.
The physical realities of traveling so fast offer other challenges, too. Because the horizon is coming at you so fast, you have to look farther down the road than you’re used to. Such is the distance that the heat haze can make it hard to pinpoint distance boards and, more importantly, your braking point.
In addition, drivers needed to come with their Top Speed Key, which automatically induces the car to check itself and ensure that it is ready to achieve these kinds of speeds. It also repositions the Chiron, putting it into its lowest suspension setting to prepare it for the aerodynamic assault when doing 250 mph.
Although it only takes the Chiron 11 seconds to reach 186 mph (300 km/h), getting up to 250 mph (402 km/h) takes most of the rest of the runway. While the car is capable of more, it’s a testament to the rarity of this experience that even a three-mile runway designed to catch space shuttles isn’t long enough to allow the Chiron to achieve its true top speed.
Still, for the 18 owners who were in attendance at this event, it’s a reminder of how wild the engineering behind the Bugatti Chiron really is.