Here Are All Of The Crazy Tricks The Tesla Roadster Just Did

The Roadster also leapt over Tesla's entire lineup, including the 13.5-foot-tall Semi.

Photo by: Tesla

By: Rob Stumpf

Oct 15, at 10:00pm ET

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Tesla just unveiled the next-generation Tesla Roadster (again).
This time, it had a few insane tricks up its sleeve.
If a sub-one-second spring to 60 MPH wasn't enough, the car landed a mid-air flip and jumped over a Tesla Semi.

It's been almost a decade, but the new Tesla Roadster has finally made its debut (again) on stage this evening. Tesla promised—in the words of CEO Elon Musk—the most "epic" product demo of all time and, I'll be honest, he did not disappoint.

After bringing the new Roadster design out for the first time ever, Tesla immediately drove the car onto a sideways half-pipe to show that it has enough suction to, literally, drive upside down.

Photo by: Tesla

That upside-down driving is thanks to a McMurty-style fan that provides up to 2G of suction, according to Tesla's VP of Vehicle Engineering, Lars Moravy. We actually saw this tech teased in a patent last August, but this is the first time we got to see it in action on the Roadster.

"This car could suck the chrome off a trailer hitch," joked CEO Elon Musk. "And it can stick upside down."

If that wasn't insane enough to see, Tesla had another trick up its sleeve. After backing the roadster down the ramp, it sprinted back up and then performed an aerial maneuver that would make even the Blue Angels jealous.

The car drove off the ramp and into the air, doing a mid-air barrel roll and blasting thrusters upwards to land softly on all four wheels. (There was no driver inside, for obvious reasons.)

Photo by: Tesla

That wasn't the only trick that the roadster pulled off.

Tesla also pushed the car to jump over the company's entire lineup of vehicles. That included the 13.5-foot-tall Tesla Semi—which it cleared by nearly double its height.

"It can do rolls; it can do crazy gymnastics. Whatever you want, really," said CEO Elon Musk.

"This is not necessarily a safety-optimized car, but it takes the fun meter to 11 out of 10," he added.

Photo by: Tesla

Tesla says that the car is equipped with a series of cold-gas thrusters that it developed with help from SpaceX. At least four are mounted under the car (which helped it leap over the lineup), and an additional two are on the front, which helped to turn the car right side up.

There are also an additional set of rear-mounted thrusters that help propel the car from zero to 60 MPH in under a second. In total, the top-trim "Rocket" version has 10 thrusters, though notably this version will be available by "invite only," according to the order site. There will also be a Performance version without any thrusters and a Thrust edition, with only the rear-mounted thrusters. All three versions come with the fan-based suction system.

Between the insane amount of downforce and compressed air thrusters (that Tesla's team admitted may have questionable street legality), Musk says that he believes it will crush "every track record.

What do you think?

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Look, however you feel about Tesla spending an extra nine years developing the Roadster, there's no denying that this was an insane product demo. We thought that Dongfeng's tunnel stunt was impressive, but this? A feat of engineering, to say the least.

Now for the bad news—if you're one of the folks who actually has their hearts set on buying the last manually-driven car that Tesla will make (according to Musk), you'll need to wait another two years. The company says it will launch in 2028. That's likely a best-case scenario, as Tesla has rarely met its announced timetables for new products. And you might not want to try these stunts at home, either.