Gumpert Apollo Sport sets Nurburgring lap record

Apollo Sport breaks road car record with a 7m11.57s lap time around the Nürburgring-Nordschleife track

The Gumpert Apollo Sport has set a new lap record for a road-legal production car at the Nürburgring-Nordschleife track as timed and reported by German magazine Sport-Auto.

The Audi-powered Apollo Sport was piloted by 26 year-old driver Florian Gruber on August 13th as the record time of exactly 7m11.57s was set. According to Sport-Auto the record was previously held by Michael Düchting clocking in 7m14.89s on a Donkervoort D8 RS06 in November 2005.  However, if our memory serves correctly, wasn't it the Radical SR8 in road legal trim that clocked 6m55s?

The 700 hp of the car is provided by a 4.2 liter, bi-turbo V8 engine supplied by Audi. It propels the Gumpert Apollo from 0 to 200 km/h in 8.9 seconds and gives the car a top speed of 360 km/h.

Roland Gumpert, a former VW executive, started Gumpert back in 2004 in order to create track-ready and track-worthy supercars that were also street legal.

Road tests for the Apollo Sport are scheduled for mid-September. A release date has not yet been announced.

 

Source: sportauto-online.de via auto-motor-und-sport.de

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Citizen_Cake Citizen_Cake
Shame it can't run fast enough away from its own looks.
August 18, 2009 12:59 pm
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2 replies
bakrione bakrione
or its name!
August 18, 2009 4:24 pm
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scratchy996 scratchy996
looks are subjective, i like this smurf. paint it matte black and it looks like a weapon. and i like the name, it sounds medieval, it fits with the car's hardcore nature.
August 18, 2009 6:37 pm
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scratchy996 scratchy996
no surprise there. the Radical RS8 is faster but i think it isn't street legal in all of Europe.
August 18, 2009 1:00 pm
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1 reply
catchmyshadow catchmyshadow
The Radical doesn´t have a german street legal licence only a less stringent british single car approval.
August 18, 2009 7:22 pm
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GRAVE GRAVE
Impressive, around 12 second faster than the ZR1!
August 18, 2009 1:01 pm
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vertigobike vertigobike
I think this record-setting races on Nurburgring will end when someone dies :-( Who the hell cares if car X is faster some seconds than car Y? Will you really buy a supercar just for this?... c' mon! Obrigado
August 18, 2009 1:02 pm
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2 replies
bakrione bakrione
the companies build the cars for the purpose of speed, so they obviously care if they win the (unannounced) competition!
August 18, 2009 4:27 pm
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xLumino xLumino
I agree, this is like a race-competition of street-legal cars and it's absolutely ok. it's the same, manufactories do in motorsport series. The Gumpert Apollo is a really amazing project. Good luck to that small company for the future..
August 18, 2009 5:59 pm
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Swifty Swifty
@vertigobike many people die trying set their best lap on Nur! before you enter Nur you sign up somekind of deal that if you die this is your guilt! aproximately 12 people die per year in Nur! so there won't be changed nothing! bye
August 18, 2009 1:11 pm
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catchmyshadow catchmyshadow
The GUMPERT in one word: HARDCORE
August 18, 2009 2:19 pm
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nickmini nickmini
This thing is as ugly and quick as hell.
August 18, 2009 3:48 pm
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carcrazy1234 carcrazy1234
yup usually the ugly cars are the fastest cars around haha.
August 18, 2009 3:57 pm
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benzboy benzboy
I find these cars funny and rediculous. When you get to a certain age or achieve some sort of finacial success, whatever, you dont need to prove anything to anyone, you know what you can and your car can do. Let the morons who have to prove something to someone or themselves take the stupid risks. I'll just keep movin along in my SL 63 and be totally content with it.
August 18, 2009 4:53 pm
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1 reply
scratchy996 scratchy996
with all respect, but i can say the same thing about the SL , it's pretty much as phallic as it gets. i think Apollo clients are serious people who don't need a Lamborghini or a SLR to pose around. there are rich people who actually have a passion for driving (the FIA GT3 drivers/owners for example) and they like a car they can drive to the track and back.maybe they want a challenge greater than their Scuderia or GT3-RS. anyway, this car is hardcore, i'm sure posers won't touch it.
August 18, 2009 5:49 pm
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HEMI426 HEMI426
You can hardly call this a road car
August 18, 2009 5:26 pm
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4 replies
scratchy996 scratchy996
why is that, because it is fast ?
August 18, 2009 5:37 pm
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xLumino xLumino
it's a roadcar 'cause it has a hard-to-get-german-street-license...
August 18, 2009 6:03 pm
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contact_edward contact_edward
I agree HEMI... It seems that many small companies find that they can build what is basically a prototype racecar (a lot like the DP's in the Rolex Series) but put a street-legal engine in it. With today's boosted engines 700+hp in street legal form is easy. This is no great achievement IMHO. To these guys, it's all about who's balls are bigger and who can get the headlines with silly #'s--no craftsmanship with these cars--just look at the body panel seams. Anybody can snap body panels onto a tube-frame.
August 18, 2009 6:12 pm
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scratchy996 scratchy996
contact_edward , i agree , they should be ashamed. like what's the deal with winning Le Mans ? you just build a prototype and put a big engine in it. piece of cake. i'm tired of these small companies pushing engineering to the limits.
August 18, 2009 6:18 pm
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catchmyshadow catchmyshadow
Roland Gumpert = Ex-Audi-motorsports-head and chief engineer
August 18, 2009 6:25 pm
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1 reply
astroturf777 astroturf777
easier to get german roadworthy if you're a german company...
August 19, 2009 8:19 am
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dbehmoaras dbehmoaras
That's not even the R! Imagine how fast the version with 800bhp would go.
August 18, 2009 9:33 pm
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1 reply
scratchy996 scratchy996
can't wait until they find a driver crazy enough to try the R version :)
August 18, 2009 10:39 pm
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moodyaaa moodyaaa
i agree ,, i think u can hardly ride it in normal roads. but am impressived !! big numbers.
August 18, 2009 9:40 pm
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GHERNAS GHERNAS
it need to survive!!
August 19, 2009 8:25 am
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contact_edward contact_edward
Scratchy, engineering limits? I doubt it. But the fallacy is not in the car itself, but the fact that the car is marketed as a useable street machine (equal and comparable to the other supercars of today). It is not comparable. If it were, I guess Ferrari, Lambo, Porsche, etc. wasted millions upon millions developing their cars. Oh, small companies? I guess Pagani has been wasting their time too.
August 19, 2009 2:28 pm
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4 replies
scratchy996 scratchy996
the engineers that worked on this car also worked on the le Mans Audis and the boss is the former Audi motorsport chief, they know their sh!t. the Audi engineers needed Audi's approval to use their Le Mans know-how in building this car. also small companies doesn't mean bad cars and low tech engineering. sometimes small companies build better products and go to the limit because they are free to do what they want , they don't have a horde of shareholders telling them what to do. btw , the Apollo is as street usable if not even more than an Enzo, a Masetari MC12,a Zonda ,or a Murcielago, a SLR Stirling Moss, a Viper ACR or an Ascari A10. Pagani are really good, but they sacrifice performance for style and their engine is not as powerful as the Apollo's. not to mention they don't have the engineers that won Le Mans 8 times in the last decade. i suggest you inform yourself before posting
August 20, 2009 1:02 pm
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contact_edward contact_edward
Now, now, no need to get testy... It's not my fault that I don't have your source of info. I couldn't find anything quite as detailed as your info on the car's history--other than their own website. Care to indulge me with your source? Anyway, I cringe when you so easily connect the Apollo's heritage with Audi's victories at Le Mans, or so easily claim that it's more steet usable than an Enzo or Murcielago, etc. Perhaps it is. Side thought: the Enzo featured many advanced technologies and innovations inside and out. Is the Apollo more advanced? Who knows? Oh well, I'm ignorant, so what the hell do I know. I'll happily concede nonetheless and give the little Gumpert an "A" for effort. Thanks for setting me straight :-)
August 20, 2009 5:45 pm
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scratchy996 scratchy996
German TV stations have some really nice car shows,with in depth interviews with engineers, car designers and test drivers. they are more based on facts and technical details than the British "funny" car shows. one example why the Apollo is so hardcore is it's chassis, average supercars have 27KN/degree torsional rigidity, a F1 car has 44KN , the Apollo has 40KN. the innovations in the Apollo are not electronic in nature like in a Ferrari , but mechanical , like in a Porsche.
August 20, 2009 8:20 pm
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justbored justbored
On facts ? They're even more biased when it comes to test a car of the Volkswagen AG than Top Gear would be when comparing a Lotus with a Tata Nano.
August 21, 2009 7:45 pm
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catchmyshadow catchmyshadow
here is the video of that lap: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIXK3vsiLkw&feature=related
August 19, 2009 7:15 pm
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1 reply
BrianWCF BrianWCF
Thanks catch. Video has been added to the article.
August 19, 2009 7:23 pm
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EH? EH?
its an insanely quick car
August 19, 2009 7:59 pm
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August 18, 2009 7:45 am By Alex Ricciuti

Filed Under: German, Nürburgring, Specialty Marques, Supercars

Tags: Gumpert Apollo Speed , Apollo Sport

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