Mad Mike's Lamborghini Huracán drift car races rally raid truck to Goodwood Festival of Speed
When the regular, 572bhp car just won't cut it...
THE FORMULA Drift champion Mike “Mad Mike” Whiddett has turned up to the Goodwood Festival of Speed this year in the most unlikely of drift cars: a mid-engined Lamborghini Huracán supercar.
Mad Mike’s latest competition car, which has been christened the “Nimbul”, is a far different beast to the already mighty Huracán LP580-2 supercar on which it’s based. The two-seater’s bodywork isn’t as it was when the car left the Lamborghini factory in Sant’Agata, Italy: it now sports a striking widebody and aero kit from aftermarket car parts brand Liberty Walk.
The exterior mods don’t end there, either, as the Lambo now rides on rubber that surrounds custom Rotiform wheels (with the ones on the rear sporting a design inspired by the iconic Lamborghini Countach supercar), and the Liberty Walk bodykit has been painted in a grey livery inspired by the livery of the Eurofighter Typhoon military aircraft.
Being a rear-wheel drive car, the Lamborghini already had the ideal drivetrain for Whiddett’s drifting ambitions, though that didn’t stop some tweaks to the chassis that further optimise the car’s ability to spectacularly shred through tyres.
A steering rack swiped from Mad Mike’s previous drift car, the Mazda RX-7-based “Radbul”, has been installed on the Nimbul, and the vehicle also uses an advanced air suspension system in place of the adaptive setup on the road-going model.
Even the 5.2-litre V10 engine, which produces 572bhp in the production car, hasn’t been left untouched in the the Mad Mike conversion. Whiddett claims his tuned engine was already producing 620bhp when work began on turning the Lambo into a drift car, and the new nitrous kit reportedly endows the punchy petrol engine with another 200bhp.
Of course, the Nimbul isn’t a purely static display at the 2019 Festival of Speed: Whiddett will be taking the lairy Lambo out for runs up the Goodwood hillclimb course throughout the weekend. But you won’t need to be beside the course in order to see the car in action, as the Auckland-born racing driver will also be showcasing it in the Festival’s new-for-2019 stunt show arena.
While the Nimbul is making its public debut at this year’s Festival of Speed, this isn’t the first time the slammed Lamborghini has had a spin around the grounds of the Goodwood Estate. Before the Festival began in earnest, Whiddett had a go at hooning it around for the video you can see above, starring alongside the Kamaz Master racing truck that (like the drift-spec Huracán) is also making its inaugural public appearance in the UK at Goodwood.
Eduard Nikolaev, a five-time winner of Dakar, was behind the wheel of the truck and the two are seen ostensibly fighting for the last parking place at Goodwood’s Summer Ball. At one point in the film, Nikolaev’s 9.5-tonne Kamaz takes off into the air while the Lamborghini passes just a few centimeters underneath.
The film also features famous people from the auto and motor sports world, such as YouTube star Archie Hamilton and The Grand Tour test driver Abbie Eaton.
Can’t see the video? Click here.
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