50 Fun Facts About Supercars

Which Lamborghini does Bruce Wayne drive in the Batman films Batman Begins and The Dark Knight?

Murciélago is the Spanish word for bat, a nod to its owner's secret identity. Lamborghini lent the makers of The Dark Knight three cars for a single chase scene.

Bugatti, founded by Italian-born Ettore Bugatti and revived by a German group, builds its hypercars in which country?

France is where Bugatti builds its cars, at Molsheim in Alsace. The town was under German rule when Ettore Bugatti set up there in 1909, and the modern headquarters is a château that was once his guest house.

Which McLaren road car of the 1990s seats its driver in the centre and lines its engine bay with gold foil?

The F1 used gold foil as a heat reflector around its V12, about 16 grams of it per car. In 1998 a prototype reached 240.1 mph, a world record for a production car at the time.

Lamborghini supercars such as the Diablo and the Gallardo are traditionally named after famous examples of what?

Fighting bulls became the theme after Ferruccio Lamborghini toured a renowned breeder's ranch in Seville in 1962. He was so impressed that he put one on the company badge.

Which Lotus sports car turned into a submarine in the 1977 James Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me?

The Esprit seen on screen was a very early S1 model. Its sharp, straight-lined 'folded paper' shape was the work of the prolific Italian designer Giorgetto Giugiaro.

McLaren named its track-focused hypercar of 2018 after which Brazilian champion of its Formula One team?

Ayrton Senna raced for McLaren's Formula One team from 1988 to 1993, and the carmaker shares the rights to his family name with the Instituto Ayrton Senna.

Which wedge-shaped Lamborghini, built from 1974 to 1990, takes its name from a Piedmontese exclamation of astonishment?

Countach comes from 'contacc', a dialect word of amazement that a worker kept uttering as the prototype took shape. Its upward-swinging doors became a company trademark.

Which film franchise featured the Lykan HyperSport, a supercar with diamonds set into its headlights, in Abu Dhabi?

Fast & Furious put the Lykan in its seventh film, where the heroes steal a chip hidden in one owned by a billionaire prince. The car's maker, W Motors, was founded in Lebanon in 2012.

Which British motoring show ranked supercars on a Power Laps board after timed runs around Dunsfold Aerodrome?

Top Gear handed each car to its anonymous test driver, The Stig, for a flat-out lap of the Surrey airfield. The time then went up against every earlier contender.

Which Bugatti, named after a Le Mans-winning racing driver, needs ten radiators to cool its quad-turbo engine?

The Veyron honours Pierre Veyron, who won the 1939 24 Hours of Le Mans for the marque. Its engine makes 1,001 metric horsepower, and the original car could reach 407 km/h (253 mph).

Which twin-turbo V8 Ferrari of 1987 was the last car personally approved by company founder Enzo Ferrari?

The F40 was designed to celebrate the marque's 40th anniversary, with a planned run of just four hundred cars. Demand was so strong that more than 1,300 were eventually built.

Ferruccio Lamborghini resolved to build his own cars after complaining to Enzo Ferrari about which part of his Ferrari?

The clutch kept failing, and by his own account Enzo Ferrari told him he might drive a tractor but would never handle a Ferrari properly. Other versions of the story differ in the details.

Which 1980s Ferrari, known for the long strakes along its doors, was driven in white on TV's Miami Vice?

Testarossa means 'red head' in Italian, after the red-painted cam covers of its 12-cylinder engine. The strakes were there because several countries outlawed large openings on cars.

Which Japanese performance car, built from 2007 to 2025, inherited the nickname Godzilla from its Skyline ancestors?

The Nissan GT-R kept a nickname that the Australian magazine Wheels gave the R32 model in 1989. It was the sixth generation to carry the letters, though no longer part of the Skyline line-up.

Which Audi supercar, built on a platform shared with Lamborghini, appeared in all three Iron Man films?

The R8 turned up as a V8 coupé in Iron Man, a V10 Spyder in the sequel and an electric e-tron prototype in the third film. Its second generation shares its underpinnings with the Huracán.

Which German circuit, nicknamed the Green Hell by Jackie Stewart, is the benchmark for production-car lap times?

Nürburgring lap times on the old Nordschleife loop have been a yardstick for road cars for decades. Carmakers share exclusive use of the track for sixteen weeks a year to develop new models.

Which German city, home to Porsche's headquarters, supplies the coat of arms at the centre of the Porsche crest?

Stuttgart takes its name from an old German word for stud farm, because it was founded in 950 to breed warhorses. The rest of the crest borrows the arms of the former state of Württemberg.

Which German carmaker took control of Lamborghini, Bugatti and Bentley within the single year of 1998?

Volkswagen placed Lamborghini under the control of its Audi division, then set up a new Bugatti company that December after taking over the naming rights from an Italian businessman.

Which door style, first seen on the 1968 Alfa Romeo Carabo concept, rotates straight up from a hinge at the front?

Scissor doors reached the road on Lamborghini's V12 flagships in the 1970s and are widely nicknamed Lambo doors. Owners have to take care when opening them under a low ceiling.

Which Lamborghini of 1966, with its V12 mounted sideways behind the cabin, is often called the first supercar?

The Miura's transverse mid-engine layout was a break from every earlier Lamborghini. Bertone finished styling the prototype only days before its debut at the Geneva Motor Show.

Which American supercar of 2005 revived the shape of the 1960s racer built to end Ferrari's run of Le Mans wins?

The Ford GT stands about four inches taller than the 40-inch-high GT40 that inspired it. It could not reuse the GT40 name because a small Ohio parts company owned the trademark and no deal was reached.

On models such as the Ferrari 488 Spider and the McLaren 720S Spider, what does the word Spider signify?

A convertible roof is said to owe the label to the horse-drawn era: light carriages with big, thin-spoked wheels were nicknamed spiders, and the name later passed to open sports cars.

In which country does Koenigsegg build hypercars in a former fighter-jet hangar, under the old squadron's ghost badge?

Sweden is where Christian von Koenigsegg founded the firm in 1994. After it moved onto an abandoned air force base at Ängelholm, it adopted the resident squadron's ghost symbol as a tribute.

In which small town near Modena has Ferrari had its factory since the early 1940s?

Maranello became the base in 1943, when Enzo Ferrari moved his workshops out of Modena during the war. It now houses both the road-car factory and the Formula One team, Scuderia Ferrari.

Ferrari's badge sets its black prancing horse on which background colour, the civic colour of Modena?

Yellow was Enzo Ferrari's own addition, in honour of his home city. The horse came from the family of Francesco Baracca, a fallen flying ace who had painted it on his aeroplane.

Which Italian hybrid flagship was introduced in 2013 alongside the McLaren P1 and the Porsche 918 Spyder?

LaFerrari means 'The Ferrari' in Italian, because it was intended to be the definitive one. The run was set at 499 coupés, each costing more than a million euros, before a 500th was built for an earthquake-relief auction.

Which hypercar, named after a Monégasque Grand Prix driver, was clocked at 304.77 mph in a 2019 test run?

The Bugatti Chiron that made the run was a pre-production Super Sport 300+ driven by Andy Wallace at the Ehra-Lessien test track. Its namesake, Louis Chiron, won the 1931 French Grand Prix.

Which engine layout, in effect two narrow-angle V8s joined together, did Bugatti's 8-litre hypercars use from 2005?

W16 engines are rarely built. This one packs four banks of four cylinders and four turbochargers into 8.0 litres, and it first reached the road making 1,001 metric horsepower.

Which British comedian owned a McLaren supercar from 1997 to 2015 and crashed it twice, the second time into a tree?

Rowan Atkinson saw the car catch fire in the 2011 crash, and the repair took more than a year. The £910,000 bill was reported as the largest car insurance payout Britain had seen.

McLaren takes its name from founder Bruce McLaren, a racing driver and engineer born in which country?

New Zealand's Bruce McLaren was born in Auckland in 1937 and founded his racing team in 1963. He was killed in 1970 while testing one of his own cars at Goodwood.

Which Porsche supercar of the 2000s used a V10 that began as a secret engine for a Formula One team?

The Carrera GT took its V10 from a Le Mans prototype that Porsche cancelled in 1999. That engine in turn was based on a unit built quietly for the Footwork team in 1992.

Which Porsche supercar won the 1986 Paris-Dakar Rally and later prompted America's Show or Display import law?

The 959 bought by Bill Gates in 1988 was refused entry and sat with US Customs for 13 years. The 1999 law finally let such significant cars in, limited to 2,500 road miles a year.

Which Jaguar supercar was promised with a V12 and four-wheel drive but reached buyers in 1992 with a turbocharged V6?

The XJ220 grew out of a concept that a dozen Jaguar staff, known as the Saturday Club, designed in their spare time. It went on to reach 217 mph in testing at Nardò in Italy.

Which Japanese company co-developed the Lexus LFA's V10, an engine that revved too quickly for an analogue rev counter?

Yamaha also shaped the car's sound, acoustically engineering parts of the intake. Lexus said the V10 could rev from idle to its redline in 0.6 seconds, so the dial had to be digital.

Which Aston Martin hypercar was developed with Red Bull Racing and its celebrated designer Adrian Newey?

The Valkyrie is named after figures from Norse mythology. Its first codename, Nebula, was an acronym of Newey, Red Bull and Aston Martin Lagonda.

Which road-legal hypercar uses a 1.6-litre V6 hybrid power unit adapted from a Formula One racing car?

The Mercedes-AMG One had its racing engine retuned to idle at 1,280 rpm and rev to 11,000 rpm on the road. Lewis Hamilton helped to unveil the concept version in 2017.

Which Maserati supercar of 2004 was built on the chassis and V12 of the Ferrari Enzo to go GT racing?

The MC12 was made so that a racing version could enter the FIA GT Championship. It came out longer, wider and taller than the Ferrari it was based on, with a lower drag coefficient.

Which mid-engined BMW supercar of 1978, styled by Giorgetto Giugiaro, began as a joint project with Lamborghini?

The M1 went back under BMW's control when Lamborghini's finances deteriorated after seven prototypes. It remained the marque's only mass-produced mid-engined car until the i8.

Which Italian supercar, powered by an American V8, did Elvis Presley shoot when it refused to start?

The De Tomaso Pantera took a bullet through the steering wheel from a small-calibre revolver, which went on to shatter the windscreen. Its name is Italian for panther, and over 7,000 were built.

Which Lamborghini of 2023 pairs a new V12 with three electric motors as the marque's first plug-in hybrid?

The Revuelto replaced the Aventador and makes a combined 1,015 metric horsepower. A gentler driving mode called Città, Italian for city, turns the power down for urban roads.

Which angular Lamborghini, sold to just 20 customers after its 2007 debut, was styled after the fastest aeroplanes?

The Reventón even has a g-force meter among its three LCD instrument displays, like a cockpit. A twenty-first car, numbered 00/20, was built for the company museum.

In which country is Rimac based, the electric hypercar maker that joined forces with Bugatti in 2021?

Croatia's Mate Rimac started out in 2007 by converting his BMW 3 Series to electric power as a garage hobby. He founded the company two years later in Sveta Nedelja, near Zagreb.

In which country was Horacio Pagani born, the former Lamborghini composites chief who founded his own hypercar company?

Argentina also gave him a hero: he planned to name his first car after his friend Juan Manuel Fangio, the five-time world champion, before it became the Zonda.

Which South African-born designer of Brabham's fan car went on to launch the fan-assisted T.50 supercar in 2020?

Gordon Murray was born in Durban to Scottish immigrant parents and built and raced his own car there before moving on to Brabham, where his designs also won world championships.

Which Gulf city's police put a Lamborghini Aventador and an Aston Martin One-77 on patrol in its tourist areas?

Dubai began its exotic fleet in 2013 with the Aventador. The cars never join chases or emergency calls, which are left to regular patrol units in standard cars.

Which American supercar took the Guinness production-car speed record in 2007 with a timed run in Washington state?

The SSC Ultimate Aero was timed at 256 mph in West Richland and kept the title until 2010. Testing at NASA's Langley Research Center had suggested it could manage about 273 mph.

Which Italian composer and producer backed the sixteen-cylinder Cizeta V16T supercar and at first shared its name?

Giorgio Moroder formed a joint venture with engineer Claudio Zampolli, whose initials, C.Z., give Cizeta its name when pronounced in Italian. The car was built in Modena from 1991.

Which Bertone designer, who died in 2024, drew the Lancia Stratos and a string of wedge-shaped Lamborghinis?

Marcello Gandini was sent to study the classics and the piano, but he left school at 18 to follow his passion for engines. Nuccio Bertone hired him at 27 to replace a departing chief designer.

Which Koenigsegg hypercar, sold out at its 2019 Geneva debut, is named in tribute to the founder's father?

The Jesko honours Jesko von Koenigsegg, whose son Christian founded the company. It succeeded the Agera and uses a development of that car's twin-turbocharged V8.

Which McLaren hybrid, revealed in 2018 and limited to 106 cars, seats its driver centrally, ahead of two passengers?

The Speedtail is claimed to reach 250 mph, and a prototype hit that speed more than 30 times in testing. Its leather is finished to hold occupants in place and can even replace the carpet.