Who Wins, Land or Air?: The Race Between a Porsche Taycan and an Electric Plane

More than 20 years have passed. British television presenters Richard Hammond and James May, aboard a light aircraft, raced from the Italian city of Alba to London against their BBC motor show colleague Jeremy Clarkson, who was driving a Bugatti Veyron.

In this new adventure, Hammond and May compete across southern England with a Porsche Taycan Turbo GT and the Pipistrel Velis Electro, one of the first electric planes available on the market.

Heading east across southern England, the race began at Henstridge airfield, on the border between Somerset and Dorset, and concluded at Dunsfold airfield, the former workplace of the two presenters and home to the famous television test track.

The 174-kilometre route (or 129 km in a straight line) was not long enough to test the Taycan Turbo GT's range of up to 555 km. However, if needed, it would only take 18 minutes to charge from 10 to 80% battery capacity, thanks to a maximum charging power of up to 320 kW.

On its journey between the two airfields, the car faced traffic, roadworks, and speed limits, while the plane could proceed unhindered. However, what would level the playing field was the plane's maximum flight time: about 50 minutes. To complete the journey, it had to make a stop to recharge at Thruxton airfield, roughly halfway. You can watch the video HERE:

As he prepared for the start of the race, May was surprised by how straightforward pre-flight checks were on electric planes. Indeed, he discovered that cars are not the only vehicles benefiting from the added convenience offered by the transition to electromobility.

The Taycan took the lead from the start. Since the race began at an airfield rather than a public road, Hammond was able to unleash the full potential of the car's impressive acceleration, provided by its torque of up to 1,240 Nm with Launch Control. It accelerated from 0 to 100 km/h in just 2.3 seconds. In fact, with a maximum system power of 1,108 hp when using Launch Control with Overboost, the Taycan Turbo GT even surpasses the Bugatti Veyron that participated in the aforementioned 2005 race.

The last two decades have seen a tremendous increase in the power of cars suitable for everyday use and designed for it. Not long ago, such figures were only achieved by supercars and hypercars. Today, Porsche makes this high thrust accessible to everyone, along with corresponding levels of control and safety, thanks to a wide range of innovative systems.

As in their famous races of the past, the presenters conducted the test face-to-face in real life, calculating the approximate travel times of the car and plane in advance to ensure a close competition. In fact, they were so evenly matched that Hammond was looking through the Taycan's optional panoramic roof, with a liquid crystal film that can change from completely transparent to opaque, to search the sky (in his own words) for "the little electric plane with a spaniel inside."

Once off the motorway and onto winding back roads, Hammond could appreciate the suspension comfort and stability. In addition to providing exceptional track dynamics, the Porsche Active Ride chassis control system, standard on the Taycan Turbo GT, offers extraordinary comfort and sports car-like reactions, shifting from one extreme to the other with just a touch of a screen. Thanks to the suspension system's ability to generate extension and compression forces (i.e., both upwards and downwards) independently on each wheel, it can compensate for road undulations and body movement, and even "lean" into corners. All of this combines to offer an exceptional level of precision and control. The various close-up shots of the wheels allow viewers to see this impressive feature in real-time, with the tyres in perfect contact with the road, while the car's body simply "glides" over bumps.

Throughout the race, the plane benefited from a strong tailwind of between 20 and 30 knots, which gave May confidence in his chances of victory and led him to enjoy more than one cup of tea during his stop at Thruxton. The plane's rapid progress, at speeds far exceeding the national limits the car had to adhere to, kept the race very close even in the final stages, as the presenters approached Dunsfold for the first time in over a decade.