Bugatti Bolide – £4m, 1600hp Track Test! ｜ 4K

Today is the day I get to drive that, Bugatti's insane Baleed. It's going to be... It hits you back and it just keeps pinning. We'll get back to the driving soon, promise. We're at Paul Ricard with Bugatti's monstrous 1600 horsepower, track-only hypercar. It's not a race car, but it is treated like one. Mechanics swarm over it. It has an appetite for fuel, tyres, laptops and cooling fans. Later, I'll have a catch-up with Matti Rimac. But first, I'm going to get my pre-flight safety checks with Bugatti test pilot and Le Mans winner, Andy Wallace. Oh, and if you hang around until the end, you'll get to see Andy take the Baleed on an uninterrupted, flat-out lap. Little bit apprehensive about this. Before I even get in, what do I need to know about it? Right, Ollie. I mean, probably the first bit of information I'm going to give you is you're going to have a hurting face when you get out with the smile. But if we go to the practical things. Yeah, I mean, it's very comfy inside. Really? It's very fast. Yes. And you've driven a lot of fast cars. You know how to drive a fast car. I've seen you do it. I think what makes this one particularly different, so you've got 1,600 horsepower, as we know, but you're not limited by traction. Shall I say that slowly? It's nuts. So even first gear, you can nail it and no wheel spin. And no wheel spin. Obviously, when it's cold, tyres cold, it'll wriggle a bit. But once it's warmed up and everything's there, you come out of the slow corners and you just peg it. This is the most dangerous thing you can say to me. You nail it in first gear off your trot. And then, even a short straight, I believe this is only 600 metres, this front straight. But you're going to be way over 300km at the end of it with a stop corner coming onto this straight. So it's incredible. So the grip, the traction and the acceleration is something really out of this world. Braking, as you'll notice as well when you're out there, it's going to be pretty impressive. And when you see how big the caliper is and how stuffed the wheel is full of brake and caliper, it's quite impressive. But when you hump on it at the other end, press with all your strength. And if you can, trigger the ABS and it will stand itself on its nose almost. So you'll have fun with that. And then it's got quite a lot of downforce too, 2,900kg at 380km. So in the high speed corners, you can really feel it helping you. Yeah, it's pretty impressive. Right, can I have a go in then? See if I fit. Absolutely. Right. Oh, wow. Wow. This is snug, isn't it? I'm surprised how small it is. You've got your hands quite close to the A-pillar here, isn't it? Yeah, although when you're driving, you don't notice that at all. So the seat itself is completely fixed. The pedals with that button there, the whole pedal box comes towards you. And it's a really substantial, solid pedal box. It is, isn't it? And then this lovely little steering wheel. Yeah, and then that for reach and rake. Okay, there's a release there. Just under there, and it's got a huge adjustable section. And obviously the dash stays on top there. Yeah, that's nice actually, because I can see clean over the top of it and get down angle onto the road quite nicely. But very high at the sides though, isn't it? It is, and the left-hand apexes are sometimes a bit difficult. A little bit tricky to see on slow corners. So you've got three screens here, just arrayed across. And they've got just digital display, you've got pro displays basically of colour tones. And if it goes red, be concerned. Yeah, so everything's alarmed to warn you if there's anything wrong. But there's quite interesting information you can have. And the two side screens scroll on these scroll wheels. And they've got three or four different pages that you can go to. I quite like that. They're quite close to your thumbs. I mean, everything's a thumb press away, isn't it? Yeah, and what I like to do on the right-hand gauge, you can put the tyre pressure and tyre temperature up all the time. And it's in small numbers, but they're very easy to see. And then all of the disc information, brake disc, temperature and things. And it's all on one page, and you can just glance at it at any point. Because brake temperatures, you need to be 450 degrees upwards? They probably work from 250, 300 upwards. So probably 250, they'll start to work. But when you first go out the pits and they're ambient temperature, you've got a very, very solid, very wooden pedal. It doesn't do anything. I mean, after all, they are proper carbon carbon brakes. But on the track, of course, as soon as you've done three or four corners, you'll have enough heat, and then it's fine. And don't be afraid to press really hard. I mean, it's a much, much harder push than you can imagine. And once you get used to it, just give it everything. And what you will have is these white flagging lights on the sides. And when the ABS is triggering, those lights will flicker in your peripheral vision. So you'll know immediately you're on the ABS. You'll also feel it, but you don't feel it like you're doing a road car. It's quite subtle. So coincidentally, it will almost allow the wheels to lock independently without intervening. So it's actually the most efficient way to stop. But it only works on a smooth track, which is why we've got it adjustable. If the track was bumpy, it would cause some instability under braking. So what I normally do is start off in the middle, say position three, and then if it's really smooth, go to four, go to five. And then that will give you the most G, the best way to stop. And that's the launch control, is it? Yep, the launch control. And so with the Shearon, you would have the sequential turbocharger. So it's easy to build boost on launch control. So you have to leave your foot on the brake, obviously, and on the throttle, and leave it for a bit longer to get the boost. To let it spool up properly. And then when it's fully spooled, just jump off the brake pedal, keep it flat, and it will disappear off. Mind you, because on most, well, on every racetrack I've ever been to, there's a speed limit in the pit lane. It's not quite so useful. Cool. I love these air vent things. They're great. They are. Yeah. These are fantastic. They really are. And they do stay where they're put, even with all the G-force that's going on. Yeah. And they work really well. Yeah. And then, go on. So I was going to say, the other one. So where you've got the ABS, you've also got five positions of traction control stroke stability control. And so the same occurs. So if you're on position one or two or three, even, you've got quite a lot more intervention. When you go to position four, it'll warn you that ESC is off. So you've only got traction control, but not stability control. Okay. And then over on here, what's that one? So because the wet tyres are a slightly different circumference, when you press that button, it tells the ECU what the circumference is of those tyres that you're putting on. Also, although the car can throw the torque front and back wherever it needs to go, the actual base setting is more rearward, quite a lot more rearward. But in the wet, you put a bit more on the front torque. Just to help pull it out of corners. Yeah. And to help with the available grip on the road. Just distribute it a bit more. Yeah. And of course, if a wheel suddenly spins out of control, it'll shift the torque where it needs to go. But the actual base setting is different in the wet. Right. This feels, I mean, it feels remarkably comfortable in here. Slightly, you know, you're aware you're in something a bit special, aren't you? It doesn't feel like just getting in a Chiron. It's very, very different. Yeah, but I mean, a seat in a car like this for this performance is very important. It's in all high-performance cars. But what you're really looking for is, yeah, it needs to be comfortable, but you need not to be moving. Yeah. So it's pretty much got you blocked. And you'll notice that your shoulders, when you shut the door, there is a push on your shoulder. Yes. And after that, you're not moving anywhere. Oh, really? And that's really nice because it doesn't, you get worn out if you're holding a steering wheel and trying to hold yourself up. Yeah. So you can just let yourself relax and you're not moving anywhere. Yeah. So get the harnesses on good and tight in this. That's it. Great. Well, shall we do that now? Let's do it. Andy's instruction was to floor it in first gear with the 40 mile an hour pit speed limiter on, and then when I exited, click it off and hold on tight. That's outrageous. Let the pit speed off and it is gone, this thing. Oh, my word. I don't know what speed we're doing. It's still not that much brake temperature in it, so we're just dealing with a little bit of slip. Nothing intimidating about that in a four million pound hyper car. Going into the fast one at the back, it feels so planted. The steering's quite light. You don't get so much sense of it like that. The brakes are outrageous. And you don't have that much steering feel. It's entirely normal. The tyre pressure, they're running quite high because the damn thing develops so much downforce that so much pressure put down into the tyres. Just let it out of there and just let it go. Oh, my word, it is absolutely relentless. The power delivery is so smooth. The gap changes just happen immediately. And, wow, and then you've got to remember to downshift. That has just eaten the whole main straight in about two sentences. And this will just go over to third. Wow, the acceleration, I can get used to it because it's a bit like I felt in the Koenigsegg once that had got grip. But, of course, at this, it gets four-wheel drive, it gets grip everywhere all the time. No issues there whatsoever. It's just through these long corners. It's just a little bit... It moves. It actually moves around. The evenness of the four-wheel drive is hilarious. It's so good like that. And then you just nail it down the straight. Right, second, third, fourth, fifth. I don't know what the speed is doing. I can't see a readout for it anywhere. There it is. It's up over 300 kilometres an hour and you just hit the brakes as hard as you can. Oh, it feels... Now the tyres are starting to get some proper heat into them and so are the brakes. It feels absolutely mighty now. The disc temperatures are up over 120% there. 7-800 degrees. The rears are at 5-600. Just going to keep turning it here and see how it grips. And then you just bury it down the straight. Oh, this is absolutely hilarious. It just pins you back and it just keeps pinning. It lets up not at all. And the brakes... Oh, my God, I've actually braked too early this time. It's so... When it starts to move, it's really benign. I can't believe it. That's astonishing. You see the bodywork panels vibrating. It's going so hard. Wow. Andy's had to tell me to back off a bit because I'd entirely forgot about doing a cool-down lap. You just get sucked into it. You get carried away. And I'm probably going to get very effusive now because, wow, I mean, the visibility out, it's not great. This A-pillar and the high front arch do block a lot of visibility into tighter left-handers, but everywhere else, wow, it goes. It really, really goes. Overall, the BLEED isn't nearly as menacing to drive as it is to look at. Its low-speed traction, high-speed stability, overall grip and those astonishing carbon brakes mean it can cope with everything the 1,600-horsepower motor can throw at it. It's very harmonious, smooth and approachable to drive. I felt safe pushing hard almost immediately. Maybe it could be more unhinged, but this way it gives you the bandwidth to fully enjoy the star of the show, the last-ever outing of Bugatti's remarkable 8-litre quad-turbo W16 engine. Right, I've just got out of the car. I'm hoarse and can barely speak. What's it like? What do you think, though? You must have driven it. Yeah, I'm a little bit jealous because you've driven it actually before me. I'll drive it for the first time tomorrow. The first time? I can't believe that a man with your reputation hasn't driven it yet. Well, I'm, you know, always super detailed about testing and driving cars, about every detail, and everyone knows when I drive one of our cars, I come back with a long list of things that I want improved or changed. With this car, just so outside of my level of competence, it's a race car, a track car, you know, I can't come anywhere near what this car can do, but someone like Andy and, you know, our professional race drivers, they are the right people to give feedback on such a car. Yeah, and so you've been in the passenger seat. Yeah, yeah. What did you think? How did you think it compared to a... Sorry, that's it just going past. How did it compare to a Chiron for you? I mean, just the G-forces that you can generate with this car, it's like far beyond any kind of road car that you can, you know, you can anywhere experience. Plus, I think what's really special about it is the combination of usability, like you have ESP, ABS, all-wheel drive in a race car that generates tons of downforce. Yeah. And did you, from the start, you wanted it to have traction and ABS, you just thought, it'll make it more manageable for the customers. Yeah, I think two things that are really special about this car, I mean, of course, the W16, but that's a given. But, you know, on one side, it's a car with incredible performance for the track, but it's also for people who don't have so much track experience, so they can feel safe approaching the limit. Like, it won't kill you. You know, as four-wheel drive, ABS, ESP, you can adjust all of it. It's safe to use. And, you know, someone who doesn't have so much experience can go really fast without feeling intimidated. And the other thing about it is also what was actually the hardest thing for this project is to make it a Bugatti in terms of details and quality. Like, one of our partners in this project was Dallara, and they are amazing at building race cars. And, you know, if you look at race cars, there are these fascinating things, but it's not a Bugatti. Like, usually, carbon fiber for these kind of cars is very different from road cars. Like, it has less layers, it's DV and so on. And when we did this thing, a race car with the performance of a race car and the level of quality that we as Bugatti expect and our customers expect, that was difficult. Yeah. And is that why the weight's gone up a bit? Because I know initially, when you first announced it, it was going to be 1,250 kilos. It's gone to 1,450 and probably more than that now. Is that what's caused that? Just that focus on getting the quality as good? Well, I think it's physics in the end because when it was initially shown as a concept, it was just an idea. Nobody really did any... I thought it was a Vision Gran Turismo car when you first announced it. Yeah, I was kind of like that. I think the designers went a bit crazy at that time and did some crazy project that they thought would never happen. Then we actually made it happen. So, of course, between that and making it a reality, there's a long way. Yeah. You could have pulled the plug on this and gone, that's a silly idea, but you decided not to because it's not a silly idea. No, it wasn't a silly idea at all. I think, I mean, it's amazing. And, you know, Bugatti didn't produce a race car for a long, long time, you know, for decades. So, I think this is... And this is exactly what a Bugatti race car should be. Like, you know, this crazy, raw, like, bonkers thing with W16 smashed into a very small, you know, car around it. So basically what we did was take a Chiron Supersport, strip out everything outside of the powertrain and just squeeze everything else then, you know... Wrap it around it as tight as you could. Exactly. Yeah, because it's not a big package, is it? And there's a lot of space, a lot of air gaps and things. You've still got to get an enormous amount of air in and through and out of it, haven't you? Yeah, exactly. Like, one of the things, like, we have this special 3D printed intercooler. So, on the W16, you have an intercooler on top of the engine and it just takes up a lot of space. And we found, like, a specialized company 3D printing the core of the intercooler. And just because they could 3D print that and make it small enough, we could even build the car because we just had to shrink wrap everything. There's interesting things in this car. Like, for example... Go on, tell me. I love it. So, the combination between power and weight makes this generate more energy that the brakes have to dissipate than any other racing car in the world, as far as I understand. More than Formula 1, more than LMP. So, this is the first race car with a three mounting points per caliper brake design. And then also, for example, it's a proper Formula 1 style LMP style suspension with torsion bars instead of springs. So, it's like proper race car stuff. It's not like some race body on top of a street car. It's the other way around. Last question then. How would you spec yours? Because what we're looking at here is a black customer car. How would you have yours? So, for me, I think because it's a race car, absolutely visible carbon. And then, you know, an homage to the Type 35, the most successful race car in history, the Type 35 from over 100 years ago. We actually did an homage like that that we showed at Pebble Beach last year. That would be my spec. Oh, really? Excellent. Matteo, thank you so much. Thank you. That was great. I really enjoyed that. Now, as promised, here's that uninterrupted lap.