Gone was any option for using those velvet-smooth, 3.0-mile military runways. Thus, our three-year stint at Vandenberg Air Force Base came to a close. But where to go instead?
Our original site for WGDR—the decommissioned Marine Corps Air Station El Toro—has become so degraded over time that we didn’t dare to take a field of supercars on it for high-speed runs. And most private airfields within reach of Los Angeles weren’t long enough to handle what has gone from a crazy idea to the expected: a half mile run to determine the ultimate winner. (Note for the uninitiated: It takes a lot of real estate to slow down a two-ton supercar doing 170-plus mph.)
Enter an undisclosed test track in the California desert. The generous entity that donated its track has asked to remain anonymous, even though Redditors will probably figure it out in about five minutes.
All we can say is that the track is sufficiently long and perfectly immaculate for world-class cars accelerating from a stop to the quarter mile in about the time it takes you to read this sentence aloud.
However, a test track is still not a runway. There is a certain matter of width. We couldn’t fit 12 cars abreast. Heck, we couldn’t fit eight. So we figured, we’ve followed this same formula for a decade—let’s change it up. And although we originally tweaked the idea of a drag race by running all the cars at once, this year we’re reverting to drag racing’s mano a mano roots: two cars and 1,320 feet; then, for the final, 2,640 feet. Loser leaves town.
Which car won? Watch the video!
