Tesla Plaid Gets Into Crazy Fight With 1,000-HP McLaren 720S

Since this drag race is part of Hoonigan's "This vs That" series, you know fun is guaranteed.

Dan Mihalascu

By: Dan Mihalascu

Sep 29, 2021 at 7:41am ET

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For a while, the McLaren 720S has dominated the drag racing scene for production cars, being the one model everyone wanted to beat.

That wasn’t too long ago, but now that we’ve seen the Tesla Model S Plaid demolish every opponent on the drag strip (except for the Rimac Nevera), it seems like ages have passed since the 720S was king of the strip.

It’s pretty clear that a stock 720S has no chance to beat a Model S Plaid in a drag race, but what about a heavily modified example?

The folks from Hoonigan had exactly this in mind when they decided to pit a 1,000-horsepower, carbon-bodied 2018 McLaren 720S against a fresh out of the box 2021 Tesla Model S Plaid as part of their popular “This vs. That” YouTube series.

To make things interesting, the guys decided to do three rounds of races, with the first being a traditional quarter-mile run with a standing start. Now, we’ve already seen the Tesla Plaid beat a 1,200-horsepower Ford Shelby GT500, so what are the odds that a 1,000-hp 720S will manage to beat the fastest Model S to date?

As you would expect, the McLaren had no chance during the initial race and its owner had to admit defeat. The Tesla Plaid got off to a fantastic start and built up a comfortable lead by the finish line.

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Things started getting more interesting in the second round as the two fast machines engaged in a 1,500-ft (457-meter) rolling race. We won’t spoil that one for you, but we will say the McLaren fared better this time.

As for the third and final round, it was another 1,500-ft rolling race specifically set up for the 720S to win. The Tesla received three passengers as ballast and the McLaren got a car length head start. Was that enough, though? Head over to the video to find out.