Think of the world's fastest cars and a few names come to mind. Ferrari. Lamborghini. Porsche. Glickenhaus.
Glickenwhat?
That would be Jim Glickenhaus. He made an ungodly amount of money in films and finance and has a thing for cars. The kind of thing that leads you to build a bazillion-dollar custom Ferrari because, you know, a Ferrari isn't extreme enough. So now he's building cars. Crazy fast supercars. He's the Glickenhaus in Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus, an American boutique automaker rolling into the Geneva auto show with the SCG 003S. Yeah, there's nothing at all graceful about the name, but who cares. Just look at the damn thing.
Now, the supercar game is all about superlatives — most horsepower, highest top speed, that sort of thing. And the Glick aims for the highest honor in this arena: fastest lap at the Nurburgring. The 'ring is the stuff of legend, a 12.9-mile track so nasty that F1 champion Jackie Stewart dubbed it the Green Hell. It is not for the weak or the stupid, and Glickenhaus wants to lap it in 6 minutes and 30 seconds. That would set a record for a production car.
For those of you who are shrugging, maybe this will get your attention: Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus claims the 003S will hit 60 from a standstill in less than 3 seconds and top out at 217 mph.
The car certainly looks the business, with all manner of wings and scoops to keep the car planted, the seven-speed sequential gearbox cool, and the twin-turbo V8 engine breathing properly. The engine, by the way, cranks out 800 horsepower and a locomotive-like 630 foot-pounds of torque. In other words, stomp on it and this sucker will bury you in the seat. The suspension is active, the brakes are carbon, and ... well, suffice to say Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus basically built a race car with turn signals and a cellphone interface.
Price? Pfft. As if you could afford it. And even if you could, you lack the skills to see, let alone explore, the edge of this car's performance envelope. But then, so do I.
