Bugatti shatters the open-top car speed record it set

Le Mans 24 Hours-winner Andy Wallace drove the Bugatti W16 Mistral to a record speed of 453.91 km/h.

Bugatti W16 Mistral speed run
Driver Andy Wallace pilots the Bugatti W16 Mistral to speeds of more than 450 km/h. – Bugatti Automobiles photo

Bugatti has broken a decade-old automotive speed record it set, and by a wide margin too.

The automaker announced that it set a new world record for the top speed in an open-top car with the Bugatti W16 Mistral.

The car reached a speed of 453.91 km/h (282.05 mph) at the ATP Automotive Testing Papenburg in Germany, Bugatti announced on Nov. 14.

That’s the same location where Bugatti set the previous open-top speed record of 408.84 km/h (254.04 mph) a little more than a decade ago in the Veyron 16.4 Grand Sport Vitesse, driven with the roof down.

Bugatti driver Andy Wallace, a Le Mans 24 Hours winner, drove the Mistral on this record speed run.

“Throughout the testing program leading up to this moment, it was incredible to feel how stable the car felt – I got the sense that it wanted to go faster,” he said in a news release.

“And when it came to the moment itself, the experience was overwhelmingly thrilling; feeling the elemental forces from the open-top cockpit, the sound of the immense W16 engine emanating from the air scoops next to my ear – it made the achievement incredibly emotional.”

Bugatti team at race track
The Bugatti team celebrates its record achievement at the test track. – Bugatti Automobiles photo

The W16 Mistral is a limited-production high-performance roadster, with only 99 units of this car planned. While it has unique styling, it’s essentially a convertible version of the retired Chiron hypercar.

It uses the same W16 engine with 1,578 hp. The engine, like the Chiron, will also be retired but it’s getting its last hurrah in the Mistral roadster.

Bugatti’s upcoming hypercar will be using an all-new V16 engine.

“Since the inception of Bugatti in 1909, the marque has sought to supersede the perceived realms of possibility in luxury, elegance and performance,” said Bugatti Rimac CEO Mate Rimac in a news release.

“The Bugatti world record cars throughout the marque’s history have represented the epitome of speed and power, setting new boundaries and redefining again and again what Bugatti vehicles are capable of. And now, with the unparalleled achievement of the W16 Mistral world record car etched into the history books, we see history not just repeating itself, but new history made.”


Leave a comment