How Did a Nissan Leaf Beat a Tesla Model S in a Race?

https://cleantechnica.com/2019/07/16/how-did-a-nissan-leaf-beat-a-tesla-model-s-in-a-race/

by luu • 7 years ago

76 104 7 years ago

Neil44• 7 years ago

The leaf was pretty well modded, tyres and suspension to keep speed in the corners would both require less regen braking into the corner and less power to get to speed on the next straight, helping to nullify the lower power and passive cooling.

jdc• 7 years ago

And the Leaf is 4-5 years newer

dangrossman• 7 years ago

Does that matter? It's still a LEAF, a sub-compact commuter car, up against what was billed as the quickest production car in the world just a few years ago. The best, newest LEAF has a single 214 hp motor dragging a battery-heavy car, giving it a 0-60 time slower than a Honda Civic. This "old" Model S has two high-performance motors delivering 691 horsepower. The 5-year-old Model S is still worth more right now on the used market than a brand new top-trim LEAF.

Wistar2• 7 years ago

Should have put it up against the Tesla Model 3 with Track Mode.

Wistar2• 7 years ago

I have driven both and lean towards the Model S a bit.

freyr2• 7 years ago

I'd expect more than "a bit" for the extra $45,000+. Tesla wins in the looks department, though.

ansible• 7 years ago

The new Leaf has improved in the looks department. The previous version was rather... I don't know what words to use, but "meh" comes to mind.

steelframe• 7 years ago

When we first replaced our LEAF with a Model X, my spouse asked if we could go back to the LEAF. They never warmed up to the Model X, and we ended up trading it for a Volvo PHEV. It took me a while to understand why they didn't like it, but it finally set in with me that not everybody is enamored with how hard the Tesla tries to make everything so different.

robomartin4• 7 years ago

The real question is: Why does this matter?

Seriously.

Driving around almost any city in the US and the only metric you might care about is whether or not your car has VTOL capabilities. These comparisons are ridiculous.

Our urban design, traffic rules and substandard drivers training have ruined efficient traffic flow and speed. At least I can still go drive on a racetrack a few times a year.

empath75• 7 years ago

Even if all of that were better, more people would drive and you’d still end up with congested roads.

ajross• 7 years ago

These comparisons are ridiculous.

Yeah, but they're fun. Overclocking consumer CPUs is likewise ridiculous, but most of us here read that content too.

I'm just happy that the notion of EV's as legitimate performance vehicles is finally breaking through.

mark-r• 7 years ago

A while ago I had to stop at a stoplight on the highway, and somebody stopped in the lane next to me. When the light turned green I stepped on the gas in my Toyota Camry Hybrid, but the other guy left me like I was standing still. Didn't see much of his car except the Tesla insignia on the back.

robomartin4• 7 years ago

Oh, absolutely, nothing wrong with fun.

The problem I have with the focus on 0 to 60 drag racing is that it says nothing about the quality, safety, driveability, real world driving performance, longevity, efficiency, suitability, reliability, features, range, autopilot quality, charging performance, insurance costs, repairability, repair costs, handling, etc.

In other words, it say nothing whatsoever about the things that actually matter for CONSUMER STREET cars.

I mean, back in the 80's I built a car (Pontiac TransAm) with a massive six litter V8 and equally massive supercharger sticking out of the hood that, quite literally, blew up both rear tires after --like a fool-- drag racing someone three lights in a row. And I do mean "boom!" and both tires blew up. I have no clue what the 0 to 60 was. All I know is that thing was a beast. And I also know it handled like crap on anything other than a straight line, it was a death-trap in an accident, and it was useless for anything other than behaving like a moron on public roadways. I am thankful that I outgrew that phase of my life very quickly.

Today I go to the race track a few times a year to drive fast on road courses, where real performance has very little to do with 0 to 60.

Which also brings up another important point: Most people are far more likely to kill themselves and others with a car that can accelerate as fast as some of these electrics do. People don't have the training and, therefore, lack the reflexes, to instinctively know what to do when a car gets away from them and they find themselves sideways staring at a bunch of people on a sidewalk.

Do we want electric cars to be compared along this axis? No. Beyond reasonable performance, say, 6 seconds, it's irrelevant and possibly a dangerous trend.

clouddrover2• 7 years ago

Why does this matter?

Just because the Tesla Model S is marketed as a performance car and being beaten by a much cheaper Nissan Leaf undermines the marketing bluster.

noipv4• 7 years ago

For relatively spirited driving, especially in the mountains, how often do Tesla's overheat? Does overheating reduce drivability dramatically? I have read that it's the Model S inverters which overheat the most, since the battery pack is liquid cooled.

greglindahl• 7 years ago

Never for me.

dzhiurgis• 7 years ago

Wow this site just keeps refreshing on iOS + adblock, making it impossible to read or even attempt to disable adblock...

impalallama• 7 years ago

Same. I'm using brave on ios and the site is straight unusable.

js2• 7 years ago

I just read it fine on iOS using AdGuard as my blocker.

stjohnswarts2• 7 years ago

Something wrong with the safari engine then. No problem on windows or linux for me with firefox and ublock

llampx• 7 years ago

I would sooner blame a badly-coded website than a browser though, especially given how most web development seems to be devolving into a "works with Chrome" monoculture.

gameswithgo• 7 years ago

tires are everything in racing, and the leaf had aftermarket tires

ourcat• 7 years ago

The ability of the drivers helps too.

Maybe they should swap cars and do it again?

metaphor2• 7 years ago

Jump to 30:00[1] for a summary of results. Leaf edged out the Model S by 7.441 seconds. Fastest lap was 1:52.271 by the Leaf; for comparison to more traditional cars[2].

What's strange is all this Model S thermal issue talk, yet the driver posted his fastest lap in the 13th. How can this be explained?

Then there's this remark from the article:

Clearly, [the Leaf driver] was keeping an eye on the temperatures and adjusting driving accordingly to finish the race before power loss occurred.

...and this[3] depicting the Leaf gauge cluster with 42% remaining at the end of the race. Was the Leaf driver even really trying? His right arm occasionally chilling on the door sill and casual commentary throughout the race was kind of funny.

[1] https://youtu.be/N-9tBPObpHk?t=1800

[2] https://fastestlaps.com/tracks/sugo

[3] https://youtu.be/N-9tBPObpHk?t=1832

microcolonel• 7 years ago

Around 27:40 it seems to be on his mind, but by then he'd already posted his best lap.

I think it is a bit unfair, though. The Leaf seems to have an advantage in the tires, and is several years newer.

I think the better race would be a TT on good AS tires in the same product range.

myself248• 7 years ago

Model S thermal issue talk, yet the driver posted his fastest lap in the 13th.

All that extra charge early in the race was weighing him down. Once he'd burned through most of the battery and lost the weight, the car got quicker. Every racer knows you don't start with more fuel than you need.

MertsA• 7 years ago

For anyone else wanting to be overly pedantic, the weight difference between a fully charged P100D and a nominally depleted P100D works out to 39.281 Nanonewtons. Those weight reduction mods are really getting out of hand. /s

dmix• 7 years ago

Anyone familiar with racing know if its okay if drivers hit the bumpy red/white edging on the track curves? Or does it slow down the car?

I noticed he was an excellent driver and still hit the sides a few times seemingly on purpose.

jaysonelliot• 7 years ago

Yes, drivers routinely clip the curbs as they go for the ideal racing line through each corner.

mhh__7• 7 years ago

For example, a good lap around spa in an F1 car means getting a blind curb at the top of Radillion at about 310 KPH

sandworm1018• 7 years ago

So long as one of the four wheels remains on the road, it isn't cutting a corner. It doesn't slow the car much on the inside of the corner as most of the car's weight is on the outside wheels, particularly with non-race cars that tend to lean/roll more. But you wouldn't see an F1 car doing this very much.

iamaelephant2• 7 years ago

But you wouldn't see an F1 car doing this very much.

You see it from every F1 driver on almost every corner of almost every lap. Have you ever even watched a single F1 race?

metaphor2• 7 years ago

They're called berms and yes that's normal. Race cars will have properly tuned dampers and suspension to handle the high frequency oscillations generated when rolling over them. Drivers use the stripes to gauge corner entry, apex, and exit when taking a line.

clouddrover2• 7 years ago

Formula 1 drivers do it routinely. If it works better for the racing line then it makes sense to do it. You can see it happening in Charles Leclerc's pole lap from yesterday's qualifying at the Italian grand prix:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LCS-7gJ57s

NeedMoreTea• 7 years ago

The racing line tries to widen every curve. You go into the turn on the outside, right over to the inside at the apex, and come out of the corner on the outside again. Try and just clip the edging on entry, apex and exit.

You've driven a much shallower turn than the road, so can take it faster. :)

slics• 7 years ago

As a racer of stock and late model cars, it allows the driver to maintain higher speeds at entry and exit of corners by utilizing every bit of track available to you. It’s more beneficial to you when the track is utilized at its entirety.

On corner entry you hug the yellow line as close as you can with full speed and much less braking, on exit because of the speed and always trying to apply minimal breaking the car it’s harder to turn so you apply enough breaking to maintain the car in the track and get as close to the corner as you can.

Hope it helps.

mhh__7• 7 years ago

You can use the change of dynamics from a curb to rotate the car around in slow corners. Watch the Monaco GP around the swimming pool and you'll see car by car clipping the sausage kerb at almost exactly the same point to get the front turned in.

segmondy• 7 years ago

Car mods aside, 2014 vs 2019 aside, Tesla driver might just be a bad driver. The only way to know is to swap the drivers and have them race again. If Nissan Leaf wins again, then it's the better car.

a13n• 7 years ago

How good of a driver do you really need to be in a car that doesn't have gears? Just push the pedal to go... Reaction time is the only factor I can think of

leetcrew• 7 years ago

shifting gears at the correct time is not even close to the most difficult part of racing. stuff like maintaining the balance of the vehicle and finding the best line through a turn is much more delicate.

Thorrez• 7 years ago

The article mentions the Leaf driver had the screen set to constantly monitor battery temperature. I don't know Japanese, but I had Japanese auto-generated captions auto translated to English, and while it was mostly nonsense, the driver did seem to mention temperature throughout the race. There also appeared to be other videos of the driver racing a leaf interspersed with the main race. So the driver's knowledge is probably largely around exactly how hard he can push the car without the battery overheating.

This is also a problem for having the drivers switch cars. If they don't have the knowledge of the car they're driving, they cannot fully take advantage of it.

ImprovedSilence• 7 years ago

No. Not at all. Picking the apex, at what speed to approach the turn, how hard to brake, when to accelerate out and how much, knowing the limits of traction of what your driving, and I’m sure much more. It’s very involved, and requires thought and decisions on top of reaction speed.

humbledrone• 7 years ago

How good of a programmer do you need to be in a language that only has two valid characters? Just press tab and space and go. Typing speed is the only factor that I can think of

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitespace_(programming_langua...

kayoone• 7 years ago

do you have any idea about driving dynamics? this was not a straight line race. It looks easy but racing fast on a track takes a lot of practice.

jerrysievert• 7 years ago

not quite the best example. it's often the driver that knows their car that wins, not the car or the driver in a random car. the better driver could lose in a car they aren't used to even if it is a "much better" car.

dsfyu404ed2• 7 years ago

I cannot agree more. There's terabytes and terabyes of GoPro and grainy Russian dashcam footage out there of people doing things that they could not do in any other vehicle on any other track/road. Practice really does help.

icelancer• 7 years ago

As I've always been told when I raced Autocross and straight drag: "The best car mod is the driver."

ctchocula• 7 years ago

They should invite F1 world champion rivals Hamilton and Vettel (or the next generation Leclerc/Verstappen) to come race. That would be a fun showing and put this question to bed. The skill difference between 2 world-class drivers would surely be less than between 2 uncalibrated drivers like the ones we see here. The Leaf driver could be much better than the Tesla driver for all we know.

The Leaf driver is a car journalist who was able to keep up with a Porsche in a less powerful car. [1]

The Tesla driver is Jitosho Hikari, who is a rally car driver. [2]

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/cars/comments/bgz0nj/a_former_assis...

[2] https://www.ewrc-results.com/entries/52859-ark-sprint-300-20...

sandworm1018• 7 years ago

> This Race Shows How Far Ahead Tesla Is

Only the most hardcore fanboy would see such a loss as as win. Ya, it was a new leaf against an old tesla. It might have been an unfair race, but this is still racing. A loss is a loss. The only answer to such a result is to bring out the better car for the next race. Until then, victory to the victors.

ummonk• 7 years ago

The Model S is basically the electric equivalent of a classic muscle car. High power at the expense of weight, and optimized for short straight line performance.

And like with classic muscle cars, it can be beaten on the track by a cheap light car tuned for good handling with a stiff suspension and good tires.

mhh__7• 7 years ago

Given that a Tesla weighs almost 2.5 Tonnes, I don't understand the desire to race them? Surely it will just perform like a bus under braking and roll around?

They also don't have manual gearboxes, which is a turn off for me personally.

dpark6• 7 years ago

Surely it will just perform like a bus under braking and roll around?

No. The center of gravity is extremely low because of all the batteries under the floor. It’s supposedly extremely stable under cornering.

They also don't have manual gearboxes

If I recall correctly, they don’t have gearboxes in the traditional sense at all. They have single speed transmissions. But I might be wrong on this.

freehunter• 7 years ago

Exactly. They could fake a manual gearbox but it would always just be a fakery. There is no shiftable gearbox at all, so it’s not an automatic vs manual transmission. It’s just an electric motor.

mhh__7• 7 years ago

It's still very heavy, which is what I meant by bus.

A Porsche 917K from the 70s can still outbrake some modern sports cars because of how light it is.

dharmab• 7 years ago

Most electric vehicles- including all Teslas- have no need for a gearbox, as "first gear" is capable of 100mph+. Removing the gearbox reduces complexity and weight.

Some electrics like the Empulse TT have included gearboxes to make operators transitioning from gas vehicles more comfortable. However, this did not catch on.

mhh__7• 7 years ago

As said elsewhere, if I were buying a car to drive I'd want a manual gearbox because of the sensation of driving it. I know why Tesla's don't have gearboxes

iknowstuff• 7 years ago

Doesn't matter. This is an old Model S which lost solely due to its poor thermals. The Model 3, particularly with Track Mode enabled, sees very little performance degradation due to thermals. Keep in mind Teslas' low center of gravity due to the skateboard battery design.

There is no need for a gearbox in a car with instant torque.

dsfyu404ed2• 7 years ago

There is no need for a gearbox in a car with instant torque.

Depending on the system's ability/need to keep the motor cool that may or may not be true.

mhh__7• 7 years ago

It's about the feel. I like shifting and doing heel-toe

cromulent2• 7 years ago

True, unless you want maximum efficiency. Interestingly the Formula E cars are reducing the number of gears over time.

https://www.hewland.com/formula-e-transmission-evolution/

One of the notable features of the new Porsche Taycan is the two speed gearbox.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20886641

blendo2• 7 years ago

"Even before modifications, the LEAF has some distinct handling advantages. First, the car is much lighter. ... Or, in short, the LEAF’s battery weighs less per kWh than the Tesla’s, and it has fewer kWh."

As Lotus's Colin Chapman wisely observed, "Simplify, then add lightness." But I think we're still 5-7 years from the 400Wh/kg batteries needed to power a lightweight (1000-1200 kg -- think of a Miata) electric car.

A sad case in point is the new Porsche Taycan 4 passenger sedan, with a curb (empty) weight of 5,100 lbs/2295 kg, and gross (max) weight of over 6,300 lbs/2880 kg. The kinetic energy of one of these lead sled's at 150mph terrifies me.

graycat• 7 years ago

1000 Kg at 150 MPH would terrify me! A little puff of wind and the thing could go airborne and 50 yards down the road land and create a smoking hole! 150+ MPH is GREAT to have, at 5000 to 35,000 feet in the air in a really solid airplane!

Moto7451• 7 years ago

As a practical matter that’s true if the body generates lift. F1, Indycar, and Prototype sports cars go faster and weigh between 700 and 900kg depending on the series and spec. Since they’re designed to generate downforce when going forward they work out fine, gust of winds and all. Turning them around backwards at full speed is problematic so they have devices to disrupt the flow of air and loose the lift they’d generate at that angle. If those devices fail... that’s when things get a bit terrifying for the occupant.

dpark6• 7 years ago

The kinetic energy of one of these lead sled's at 150mph terrifies me.

The reality is that a semi-truck loaded up with produce is a bigger risk from the “turns my car into shrapnel in an crash” scenario.

Also, do you live in Germany or just near a bunch of extremely reckless and extremely wealthy drivers?

blendo2• 7 years ago

I'm speaking from a California perspective, so yes, we have fair number of poor drivers. But I have NO concerns with Porsches on the Autobahn. In fact, I had a Porsche up to 270kph between Stuttgart and Karlsruhe once. Thrilling, but kind of terrifying (and I was a pretty well trained autocrosser back then).

jboles• 7 years ago

Kinetic energy rises with the square of velocity... and the Porsche is much more likely to be driving unsafely/like an ass than the truck, or in my experience, even a BMW...

jansan• 7 years ago

The Tesla S P100D Performance weights 2250kg, which is almost the same as the Porsche Taycan. Giving the superb handling and breaking power of the Porsche, I would regard the Tesla as an even greater risk.

et2o• 7 years ago

Ridiculous comparison on aftermarket tires. Tires are everything for lap times.

rasz• 7 years ago

by drafting 2/3 of the distance in an 50km endurance race against 2014 Tesla S

baybal2• 7 years ago

Nissan leaf — curb weight 1600

Tesla S — curb weight 2200

There are no other explanations needed

How Did a Nissan Leaf Beat a Tesla Model S in a Race?

Related Stories