Unlike other automakers, Tesla is headquartered in the hills of Palo Alto next to beautiful rolling hills with lush green scenery and horse crossing signs. As you can imagine, a place like this would have some of the best driving roads in the country. We were slightly disappointed that the man behind it all, Elon Musk, was out of town. But coincidentally this gave us the perfect opportunity to borrow his personal Roadster Sport while he was gone.
The CEO’s Roadster came fully loaded with all the carbon fiber you could dream of — which it needs to keep weight around 2,700 lbs. The fully electric car has a 990 lb battery that delivers 215 kW of power. It’s capable of propelling the Roadster to a supercar-fast 0-60 mph in only 3.7 sec. Not only is the Roadster fast, but it also has an enormous range of 245 miles. A fully charged battery stores 56 kWh of electric energy (the Volt’s battery stores 16 kWh).
During hard testing in the mountains we clocked 165 miles before the low battery warning light came on. Considering our driving, it’s hard to believe Top Gear only made it 55 miles.
There is something very magical about driving the Tesla Roadster. It’s the realization that the future is truly here. Not only is the Tesla an electric car, it’s also engineered to perform. You can see that in every sharp turn or long straightaway. The Tesla Roadster pulls forever as if powered by smiles, a childhood dream come true.
