I finally managed to blag a ride in a Tesla, a P100D with ludicrous mode too! (P for performance, 100 for the battery capacity, D for duel motor meaning AWD)
We were that keen, me and brother arrived at our friends house before my friend was even home, never mind the Tesla owner. About 15 minutes sat outside gazing at the sea in anticipation, the model S gracefully and silently glided around the road in full view. It looked pretty elegant with dark blue paintwork and the 21" anthracite wheels complimenting the colour nicely. The pure white leather was not to my taste, but suited the futuristic, minimalist interior well. After looking around the car, of which I felt like I knew anyway after watching hours and hours of various Tesla related YouTube videos, eventually the time came to have a ride, I sat in the front, my brother and friend in the rear.
If you've not experienced a 2 ton car that can reach 0-60 in 2.28 seconds, it's hard to imagine exactly how it feels. It's unsurprisingly slightly insane, its like nothing else really. Think of a reverse bungee or slingshot, instantaneous, smooth acceleration that doesn't ease off until you do. You're thrown into you seat and pinned there, your feet begin lifting off the floor. There's a split second of surprise panic, disbelief, even though you tried to prepare yourself, followed by uncontrollable hysteria and laughter. It fires off like a rocket destined for the moon, you can actually feel your insides moving and your face pulling back, it's kind of terrifying and yet exhilarating at the same time. And of course it's utterly silent besides wind noise which builds and builds with the speed, which plays havoc with your mind, so used to associating loud noise and speed in high performance applications like this.
The owner loved the car, he said it was "peaceful" to drive and it helped him calm down. His other daily driver which he's had from new was an Aston Martin with 188,000 miles on the clock. His concerns with the Tesla were build quality, obviously used to high end luxury sports cars, the Tesla is a little flimsy, in fact he'd just had it back from the workshop after buckling a wheel and bending the chassis after hitting a rock at a relatively low speed. The Model S is obviously targeted at the US market, in reality it's far too wide for UK roads.
The owner had had 320 miles on a full charge, with 40 left apparently, proving range anxiety is a myth for high end EV's. His other concerns were lack of infrastructure in the UK, there isn't one Supercharger in Wales at all yet, although he lives in East England, he told our friend not to expect to use anything electrical whilst he was charging it on the standard 3 point plug as it consumes so much power, it usually trips the electrics. So there we go, a great car in many aspects, I'm still a huge fan of Tesla even though the fit and finish doesn't relate to the hefty price tag, it's a revolutionary car made by a tech company that obviously knows what they're doing, that is helping to push the EV disruption. Comments/questions welcome.
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