Driver Clocks 103mph Average Speed Over 2800 Miles, Smashes Cannonball Record

Using a modified E63, someone’s obliterated the coast-to-coast Cannonball Run, driving from New York to Los Angeles in 27 hours and 25 minutes
Driver Clocks 103mph Average Speed Over 2800 Miles, Smashes Cannonball Record

The US road network is only getting busier, and yet the Cannonball record has been broken once again. Well, not so much broken as obliterated.

Arne Toman, Doug Tabbutt and Berkeley Chadwick departed New York on 10 November, arriving in Los Angeles 27 hours and 25 minutes later. Just over a day to travel 2826 miles by car. Before you reach for your phone’s calculator, that’s an average speed of 103mph. The previous record - set in 2013 - was 28 hours and 50-minutes, which smashed the 31-hour, four-minute run from Alex Roy and Dave Maher in 2006.

This doesn’t happen all that often, in other words, even though more people attempt it than you’d expect. For this latest record, Toman drove a modified 2015 Mercedes-AMG E63 saloon, with its V8 pumping out 700bhp thanks to bigger turbochargers and breathing modifications. A high-capacity fuel cell was installed in the boot, while strategically-placed tape at the rear made the super saloon look as nondescript as possible.

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The car was also packed full of electronic gear to help avoid any run-ins with law enforcement. Tabbutt took charge of radar detection equipment, a laser jammer plus an aircraft collision avoidance system to help spot any police aircraft overhead. The car even has kill switches for the brake and tail lights.

The endeavour went much further than the three men in the car, too. 18 spotters were recruited along the route, who’d travel along big chunks of it to check for any issues.

Perhaps the most impressive thing of all is the time the trio spent stopping for fuel - just 22 and a half minutes. Anyone with children would kill to just do one stop on a long journey in that kind of time…

Image via YouTube/VinWiki
Image via YouTube/VinWiki

All of this is unofficial. With an average of 103mph, itself higher than any posted speed limit in the USA, going even faster for long stretches was inevitable. Speeds over 160mph were regularly achieved from the sounds of it, and an image of the journey data - seen in a VinWiki video - seems to suggest the E63 at one stage hit 193mph.

A Cannonball record involves breaking a lot of laws, so it simply can’t be officially sanctioned. It prompts mixed feelings even within petrolhead community - impressive though Toman and co’s run was, there will inevitably be questions about safety. He told Fox News: “Anyone who’s done it realizes how safely it can be done,” adding, “We’re not passing on the shoulder. You try not to negatively effect [sic] anybody on the road. Drawing attention just gets you called into the police.”

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These runs do have quite a back-story, though. The high-speed tradition can be traced back to Erwin Baker’s 11-day coast-to-coast run on a motorbike in 1915, which the bike and car racer got down to just 53 and a half hours in 1933 using a Graham-Paige ‘Blue Streak’. That record stood for 40 years.

In the 1970s, motoring journalist Brock Yates founded the Cannonball Baker Sea-To-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash road race, cementing the idea into automotive culture.

Will this latest tribute to the Cannonball run be bettered? It’s a tall order, but some will certainly try.

Sources: VinkWiki, Road & Track

Comments

Harrison Joyce

googles north to south uk fastest time

12/04/2019 - 15:01 |
44 | 0

September 2017 when Tommy Davies and Tom Harvey completed the 841 mile journey in 9 hours 36 minutes if you want the record for John O’Groats to Lands End, the data has been withheld due to the 86.7mph average speed time in a heavily modified Audi S5 with massive fuel tanks in the back and enough jamming equipment on it to make it invisible to speed cameras and police Lidar and other things, all of which is worth a prison sentence

This is all up on this page here if you want it :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land%27s_End_to_John_o%27_Groats#Motoring

12/04/2019 - 15:18 |
22 | 2
Anonymous

Bro this is some NFS HP 2010 and Rivals level of Jammers.

12/04/2019 - 15:02 |
110 | 0
......

In reply to by Anonymous (not verified)

Imagine if the cops started chasing him and he threw spikes or emps at them

12/04/2019 - 15:09 |
56 | 0
Robert Gracie

Well it was expected the Ed Bolian record would be eventually beaten! but congrats to the guys who did this!

12/04/2019 - 15:13 |
20 | 0
Tomislav Celić

Cool. Very lethal but very cool.

12/04/2019 - 17:31 |
2 | 2
Anonymous

There need to be an Atlantic coast to Pacific coast, not through America, but through Europe and Asia

12/04/2019 - 19:27 |
16 | 0
Anonymous

Alex will reclaim the record in a year thats a gaurentee

12/04/2019 - 21:20 |
4 | 4
Anonymous

In reply to by Anonymous (not verified)

Imagine unironically taking out a tiny, mid-90s car with barely any power and reliability on a 2800-mile race, and wanting to beat a 700-horsepower cruiser without blowing up your internals.

Boy, you sure are quite the joker.

12/06/2019 - 06:43 |
0 | 6
DJ N

The aircraft collision avoidance system is brilliant. Also a perfect car for robberies, getaways, etc, if you haven’t been spotted to begin with!

12/07/2019 - 01:48 |
4 | 0
Anonymous

long ago, I averaged 150kmh with a 3.0 diesel bmw, on a shorter distance of course. a modern 3.0d would be more suitable for this task because it would stop for refueling a lot less, and since some of them go close to 400hp, 160mph is easy

03/28/2020 - 14:37 |
0 | 0
Anonymous

In reply to by Anonymous (not verified)

I mean why the fk do people need 700hp, 250 is more than enough for daily driving and occasionally messing around

03/28/2020 - 14:38 |
0 | 0

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