2021 Porsche Panamera Turbo S sets lap record for production sedan at Atlanta circuit – 1 min 31.51 secs

Porsche, a brand that is no stranger to the Nürburgring Nordschleife circuit, has just set the production sedan lap record at the Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta circuit. The weapon of choice this time is the 2021 Panamera Turbo S facelift.

Piloting the four-door grand tourer around the four-kilometer track was professional race car driver Leh Keen. He set a benchmark lap time of one minute 31.51 seconds, which is slightly quicker than the Taycan Turbo S‘ time of one minute 33.88 seconds.

“The engineers found a perfect balance,” said Keen. “They really made it feel small and sporty. The stability gave me a ton of confidence to use every bit of the asphalt and curbs. And yet the car has a completely different and more refined and relaxed character on the highway – an amazing combination.”

Key in achieving this result was the fitment of the new optional, newly-developed Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 ND0 ultra-high performance tyres. These road-legal rubbers (275/35 ZR21 up front and 325/30 ZR21 at the back) were tuned at the Nürburgring specifically for the Panamera.

To recap, the Turbo S is powered by a 4.0 litre V8 engine that now makes 630 PS at 6,000 rpm and 820 Nm of torque between 2,300 rpm and 4,500 rpm. That’s good for a century sprint time of 3.1 seconds, while the 0-200 km/h is done in 11.2 seconds. There’s also the long-wheelbase Turbo S Executive, which is just 0.1 seconds slower in the 0-100 km/h sprint.

Standard features include Porsche Ceramic Composite Brakes (PCCB), Porsche Torque Vectoring Plus (PTV+), rear axle steering and Porsche Dynamic Chassis Control Sport roll-stabilisation system (PDCC Sport). You may watch the lap record attempt in the video, below.

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