18kg lighter too, not that anyone cares.
Bugatti may be the byword these days as the penultimate purveyor of vehicular speed, but not many have really associated the brand and its two modern cars, the Veyron and Chiron hypercars, with agility and handling. Sure, the Veyron may have had variants like the SuperSport that promised to be more focused but really, it was always about the top speed.
And so we can’t help but wonder why, despite us still not knowing how fast the Chiron can go, they’ve spent quite a bit of time making this, the Chiron Sport. Bugatti claim the Chiron Sport is some 5-seconds faster than the bog-standard Chiron down the Nardo handling circuit in Italy, thanks to an extensive set of revisions that have seen the car shed some weight.
How much weight, you find yourself not-asking? About 18kg. That saving was achieved by swapping out a whole bunch of parts with carbon-fibre equivalents, and so things like the stabilisers, the intercooler covers, and even the windscreen wipers were all given the carbon-fibre treatment in the name of weight savings. Further, the wheels on the Chiron Sport are of the lightweight variety, and the rear window and exhaust deflector were also swapped for more lithe versions.
A handling package has also been applied to the Chiron Sport, justifying why it’s called the ‘Sport’ and not the ‘Lite.’ Anyway. The rear-axle differential has been optimised in this application, and there’s even a new Dynamic Torque Vectoring system that moves power from side to side, to improve the “behaviour and agility” of this enormous machine. Bugatti even says that revisions to the shock absorbers means that the Chiron Sport is now a staggering 10% stiffer than the standard car… in Handling Mode.
No revisions under the bonnet though, so the 8.0-litre W16 power plant continues to produce 1,103kW and 1,600Nm to torture all four wheels. The century sprint is completed in just 2.5-seconds, while the present-day top speed of the Chiron Sport (and indeed, the Chiron) is limited to just 420km/h to protect the tyres.
If you must know, the Chiron Sport will set you back a whopping €2.65-million in Europe (or about $4.2-million). And don’t worry: No one will mistake your car for a bog-basic Chiron anytime soon, not with those quad exhausts and pretty wheels.
Stay tuned to CarShowroom as we bring you more updates as they come.
