The McLaren 720S Has Finally Been Beaten In A Rolling Drag

After wasting just about everything it has come up against, the McLaren 720S has finally met its match for straight line speed... and it's a motorbike

Matt Kimberley

Updated: 05 Apr 2018

The McLaren 720S has proved how ridiculously, face-bendingly fast it is against all sorts of machines, most recently out-dragging a Dodge Demon from a rolling start – a race that wasn’t even close.

Today, CTzens, we can bring you a video that was originally posted a few weeks ago, showing an informal rolling drag race between a 720S and a lightly tuned Kawasaki Ninja H2 motorbike. The 710bhp 4.0-litre V8 in the McLaren faces off against a 230bhp supercharged one-litre four-pot (although a ram-air effect boosts that to over 240bhp at speed). That is a very, very quick bike.

It’s a measure of the 720S’s epic, brutal acceleration that it gets the drop on the bike in both the rolling drags in this video, from what we think is about 40mph. It’s only after a second or two, when the Ninja gets into its stride, that it begins to dominate. That thing is a weapon. Needless to say, silly speeds are quickly achieved…

Comments

Now put them on a twisty track

Doitwithdan

Come on, the 720S isn’t even close to being the most powerful (5,007 hp in new production Devel Sixteen for internal combustion, 2,080 hp in Arash AF10 for hybrids, 1,914 hp in the new Rimac C_Two for EV; 720S has only 710 hp) or fastest production car (243 mph in older McLaren [F1; first hypercar ever made], 242 mph in Koenigsegg CCR, 253 mph in Bugatti Veyron 16.4, 257 mph in SSC Ultimate Aero TT, 268 mph in Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Super Sport, 270 1/2 mph in Hennessey Venom GT, 284 mph in Koenigsegg Agera RS; top speed on 720S is only 212 mph).

It doesn’t matter. The drag racing community cares about value, and although £208k is a LOT of money, a £2m Bugatti Chiron would never be the drag racing king because it’s a £2m car. There is a separate argument as to whether an Agera RS would be able to put down any power, so in this case, the 720S’ place in the automotive feudal system is completely irrelevant as it is still a stupidly fast car.

That Ninja is a pretty devastating bike as stock. Given what ‘lightly tuned’ equates to in the car world, it should be a stupidly fast machine.

Is this finally the car to beat big turbo supra’s from a roll? I never thought this day would come

Maybe. 9.7 in a Quarter mile is insanely fast.

I don’t see much of a difference in this and the run with the Demon. All three vehicle in these instances were completely different or made with completely different things in mind.