How one man plans to shake up the Nürburgring lap record

The latest Nürburgring lap time fuss was kicked up when Lamborghini announced its hardcore new Huracan Performante had lapped the legendary 12.9-mile German circuit in 6min 52sec. Half of the internet celebrated. Half of it cried foul, wondering aloud how a 631bhp Lambo could topple the benchmark 874bhp Porsche 918 Spyder. Armchair critics soon began dissecting the in-car video footage released by the firm.

Why the fuss? Because Nürburgring lap times matter. They’re a badge of honour to car manufacturers, and the fast pace of development involved in Ring race honours has seen the notoriously challenging track’s lap time record fall by almost a minute in a decade. When everything can do more than 200mph and 0-60mph in under 3.5sec, this is the time that splits the men from the boys.

How frustrating, then, that measuring it is such a grey art. Some brands use super-sticky tyres. Some install roll cages, and remove weight from the rest of the car to compensate. Most measure timing themselves, rather than by an independent observer. It’s all far from ideal, says US car enthusiast Jim Glickenhaus. Who has an idea.

It’s called the Glickenhaus Road Cup, which “will be run at the Nürburgring 24 Hours after the race cars qualify. An individual has to own the car, so there’s no bulls**t, and it has to be road registered and legal. You start at Cologne and then drive to the Nürburgring on the same set of tyres you will set a time on – they have to be real road tyres, not special tyres that get dropped off at the circuit in a safe.”

Then everyone drives and sets a lap time. Fastest wins. Simple.

Simple, and exciting, and thoroughly unlikely. Pity. But who is this guy with the crazy idea? Why, someone who commissioned Pininfarina to build a one-off Ferrari called the P4/5, and then a Competizione version, and then going on to spend a further £16 million building his own racing car called the SCG 003.

This is why he’s so keen on doing something new with the Nürburgring lap time battle. Because the race version can do a 6min 20sec lap, and he reckons the road-going version of the SCG 003 might be not far shy of that. Certainly, potentially much faster than the record-holding Lambo…

Glickenhaus is obsessed with the road-approved part of the challenge, which is why his competition has been configured so. “I’m not taking about a rich person putting a registration plate on an LMP1 racing car. I’m saying it’s got to be real: headlights, tail-lights, windscreen wipers, bumpers.” A like-for-like, winner-takes-all shoot-out.

British specialist maker Radical is on board. German authorities don’t recognise the wild 6min 48sec lap time set by its SR8 LM, but they’d be invited to Glickenhaus’s challenge, and admit it’s something they’d be interested in. Whether other car manufacturers would be so keen would remain to be seen. If they don’t come, privately-owned cars driven by racers could take their place.

It still sounds a far-fetched idea, of course. But that’s to underestimate the force of nature that is Jim Glickenhaus. He’s hoping to get the first Glickenhaus Road Cup running next year, ahead of the N24 race. Don’t bet against him getting his wish and shaking up the Nürburgring lap time challenge in the most dramatic way.