Porsche 918 hits 293km/h at Phillip Island

Mattias Hoffsuemmer knows the Porsche 918. As the car’s chief instructor, he’s done 40,000km in the things. Yep, forty thou – a lap of the equator.

But you wouldn’t think he’s never driven Phillip Island, let alone been to Australia before, watching him blast around one of the nation’s quickest, most intimidating racetracks in Porsche’s 652kW hybrid hypercar.

MOTOR was sitting next to him, a little nervous, as he hit 293km/h down Phillip Island’s front straight, teetered on the precipice of adhesion, at 190km/h, through turn one, and proceeded to make mincemeat of the rest of the circuit.

He did a 1:38.02, meaning he’d still get wiped by a V8 Supercar (the outright V8 record, according to the Phillip Island website, is a 1:32.02 by Jamie Whincup in 2013) but still, not bad for something on road tyres – you can be certain that there’d be a fair few seconds up for grabs on slicks.

Watch – and enjoy.

(Meanwhile, MOTOR was thrown the keys to the 918 and unleashed around Phillip Island – read our review here.)

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