All eyes are on Koenigsegg as it blasts past Bugatti’s former 267.9 MPH top speed record.
Over the weekend, Nicklas Lilja — a factory driver for Koenigsegg — set a new record in a customer’s Agera RS. With an average speed of 277.9 mph clocked from two runs on a closed Nevada highway between Las Vegas and Pahrump, the Agera RS is now officially the world’s fastest street-legal production car. Until Saturday’s record speed run, the Bugatti Veyron Super Sport held the production car speed record at 267.9 mph back in 2010.
If you have ever been curious as to what it’s like to zoom more than 200 mph in the cockpit of a hypercar, check out the video below.
Koeniggsegg Agera RS hits 284 mph – VBOX verified
The video shows both speed runs: the first outgoing run reached a top speed of 272 mph, the return leg was even faster at 284 mph. The two speeds were averaged together to get the official time.
After destroying the Bugatti Chiron’s 0-400-0 kph (0-249-0 mph) run by 5.52 seconds on October 1. It was more than plausible that Koenigsegg could crush Bugatti’s top speed record. Using the same supercar that shattered the Chiron’s 0-249-0 mph record, Lilja and founder Christian von Koenigsegg proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that it could be done.
On paper, the Agera RS weighs 1395 kilograms. It uses a twin-turbo 5.0-liter V8 to send 1341 bhp and 944 lb-ft torque to the rear wheels. The Agera RS is lighter by 600 kg and more aerodynamic than the 1500 horsepower AWD Chiron. As a result, the Agera RS has the advantage if you do a little math and analyze the numbers.
Koenigsegg has thrown down the gauntlet. They have crushed two of Bugatti’s speed records. The question now: does the storied Veyron’s successor have another trick up its sleeve to reclaim the speed record?
