If you reuse this image, please credit and link back to historicracer.com.You know you’re going fast when your support and chase car is capable of 186mph. And that’s just for checking the comms links. Jaguar are teaming up with Bloodhound SSC in their quest to move the land speed record beyond 1,000mph. The current record stands at 763.035mph and was set by Andy Green in Thrust SSC in 1997. Andy will also be driving the Bloodhound Supersonic car.
Jaguar are joining the project with the new AWD F Type R. Fitted with the same radio equipment as the jet and rocket powered Bloodhound SSC, the F-TYPE was driven head-to-head at top speed with a similarly equipped L39 Albatross jet flown at 500mph and just 50 feet above the ground. The combined closing speed of almost 700mph enabled the successful test of the system that will allow communications between the ground crew and Andy Green in Bloodhound SSC, which will run for the first time on the Hakskeen desert just twelve months from now.
An all wheel drive F Type wasn’t on my radar as a course that Jaguar would take. We drove the F Type R convertible briefly earlier this year and loved the purity of it’s handling and responses. Historically, the conventional wisdom is that four wheel drive introduces understeer at some point on the handling process. Jaguar claim to have engineered a car that doesn’t lose any of it’s rear drive enjoyment. Ian Hoban, Vehicle Line Director, Jaguar said: “Our target with engineering the all-wheel drive F-TYPE was to maintain the engaging rear-drive character that’s so important to Jaguar sports cars, yet offer even greater dynamic capability. The result is a controllable, exploitable and blisteringly fast performance car in all weather and road conditions.”
If you reuse this image, please credit and link back to historicracer.com.
Given that every Jaguar we’ve driven over the last twelve months has been superbly balanced, even the XF Sportbrake with ride leveling, it will be interesting to drive this car across a greasy Yorkshire winter A Road…
The Bloodhound / Jaguar linkup isn’t just a marketing exercise, though. The two are heralding this as a major technical partnership, with the full details to be revealed by Andy Green at the LA Auto Show on 19 November.
If you reuse this image, please credit and link back to historicracer.com.
If you reuse this image, please credit and link back to historicracer.com.
