There can be no car that can do it all, yet there is. It should have been impossible, but they built 450. They are known as Bugatti Veyrons, the fastest cars the world has ever seen.
There are many people out there who have no respect for Volkswagen’s Bugatti. They say its too heavy, too expensive to drive regularly and isn’t pretty enough to be a supercar. Personally, I never cared much for the Veyron either. When I saw some on the street, I thought they were too big and imagined them to be way too sophisticated to be exciting enough. When the last one was displayed at this year’s Geneva Motor Show, I took one quick look, and that was it. The end of an era.
But that doesn’t mean I don’t admire the Veyron’s engineering and the craftsmanship involved. If Spinal Tap went to 11, Volkswagen went to 16 for the Veyron. The car’s numbers were mind-blowing in 2005 and with the 1,200 hp Vitesse still out there, it remains utterly unbeatable ten years on.
John Hennessey will tell you how his Venom can go faster in a straight line, and he is not wrong. My money is actually on Christian von Koenigsegg for beating the Veyron in every situation, but for now, I see no car on the market that can do what this decade-old engineering masterpiece can achieve.
Apparently, I also never went fast in my life. This is something I must keep working on, relentlessly.
Contact the author at mate@jalopnik.com.