Colin Chapman spent his career chasing one idea: add lightness. Decades after his death, the company he founded is still doing exactly that, and the Emira 420 Sport is the proof. Lighter, sharper, and now available with a panel that turns it into a convertible whenever the mood strikes. It was unveiled on May 26 as the most powerful, lightest, and most aerodynamically capable Emira the company has ever produced.

It is the kind of car that exists because the engineers could not leave the standard Emira alone. They wanted more response, more downforce, less mass, and a sharper connection between the driver’s hands and the road. So they built it. The result sits at the top of the Emira range and, quietly, makes a case for being one of the most engaging sports cars for sale today at any price.

Less mass, more menace

Plenty of manufacturers add wings and vents for the look. Lotus added them for the airflow. A revised front splitter, reshaped front vents, extended side sills, larger air intakes, a lip spoiler, and a louvered tailgate work together to feed more air where the car needs it most. Airflow to the outboard radiators climbs by 15%, the central radiator gets 14% more airflow, brake cooling improves by 10%, and exhaust valve airflow jumps by 30%. Crucially, none of this comes at the cost of additional drag, which means the car runs cooler and more consistently on track without sacrificing straight-line speed.

The visual updates do double duty, subtly nodding to the Esprit Turbo and reminding everyone that Lotus has been building lightweight wedge-shaped sports cars since long before the current crop of competitors existed. Function first, heritage second, but both present in every line.

Sharper everywhere it counts

Underneath the bodywork, the 420 Sport tightens the formula that already made the Emira a critical favorite. Ride height drops fractionally. Suspension settings are revised. High-performance tires replace the standard rubber. The bonded aluminum chassis and double wishbone suspension carry over, preserving the ride-and-handling balance that defines the car, while the electro-hydraulic power steering continues to deliver the kind of detailed feedback that electric racks struggle to match.

Inside, the cabin has been reworked for dual duty on road and track. Twelve-way adjustable seats, a driver-focused layout, and new carbon fiber gearshift paddles with updated haptics keep the experience tactile and immediate. Director of Attributes Gavin Kershaw described the 420 Sport as taking the Emira’s celebrated foundation and pushing it further, with adjustable dampers, more downforce, sharper responses, and reduced roll, all obsessively engineered to put the driver more in control. The language is marketing. The intent, as stated in the spec sheet, appears genuine.

A roof that disappears

Here is the feature that broadens the 420 Sport’s appeal beyond the track-day crowd. For the first time, the Emira offers a removable tinted glass roof panel, inspired by the Esprit, that lifts out by hand and stows behind the seats in a protective bag. No motors, no folding mechanism, no added complexity, and critically, no compromise to the car’s structural rigidity or dynamic behavior. Lotus engineered the underlying architecture so the car drives identically whether the roof is in place or in the trunk.

Better still, the panel is not exclusive to the 420 Sport. It is now available across the entire Emira range, which means any Emira buyer can have open-air driving for the price of a single option. It is a rare case of a halo variant introducing a feature that benefits the whole lineup rather than hoarding it for the most expensive trim.

Color, carbon, and a paint called Tangelo

Personalization options have expanded considerably. An exterior carbon fiber pack adds the front splitter, side sills, wheel arch vents, side pods, rear spoiler, and diffuser surround for buyers who want the lightweight aesthetic to match the lightweight engineering. Nine wheel designs are offered, including a new 20-inch, 15-spoke, forged alloy wheel in satin dark grey. The color palette runs to 16 choices, anchored by Tangelo Orange, a vivid hue exclusive to the 420 Sport that continues Lotus’s long love affair with expressive orange paint. Two cabin packs round out the options, including a Hand Painted Pack that splashes Tangelo Orange highlights across the console, steering wheel spoke, gear lever, and air vents.

What it means

The Emira 420 Sport carries a particular weight beyond its impressively low curb figure. Lotus has confirmed that its future leans toward electrification and hybrid powertrains under the Focus 2030 strategy, with a hybrid V8 supercar already on the horizon. That makes the combustion-powered Emira, in its sharpest and lightest form, something close to a farewell to an era. CEO Qingfeng Feng called it proof of obsessive engineering and a car built for drivers, and for once, the corporate framing rings true.

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Newest Addition to Jesko Absolut’s Record Collection

The Koenigsegg Jesko Absolut is basically on a first-name basis with world records at this point. Not long ago, it was duking it out with the Rimac Nevera R for acceleration (and braking) bragging rights. Turns out, Koenigsegg had a few more tricks up its sleeve.

On Sweden’s National Day, June 6, Koenigsegg rolled back to its home turf in Ängelholm with the Jesko Absolut in tow. If you’re wondering about the name, it’s a nod to Jesko von Koenigsegg, the founder’s dad. The mission? Build the fastest Koenigsegg ever. Simple as that.

Factory test driver Markus Lundh took the wheel in a fresh in-house video and didn’t just break one record – he smashed two. With Racelogic VBox gear keeping things honest, the Jesko Absolut is now officially the fastest production car over both the quarter-mile and half-mile.

Faster Than the Nevera and the Corvette ZR1X

The Jesko Absolut blitzed the quarter-mile in just 8.54 seconds, blasting past the line at 305 km/h (190 mph). That’s not just quick – it’s historic. No other production car has ever cracked 300 km/h in the quarter-mile before.

But the Jesko wasn’t done showing off. It kept its foot down through the half-mile, hitting 373 km/h (232 mph) in just 12.76 seconds. Another record, just like that.

Those numbers put the Jesko Absolut ahead of some seriously heavy hitters. The Rimac Nevera has been the straight-line king for a while, and Chevy’s new Corvette ZR1X has been making waves too – at least for an American nameplate. Now, Koenigsegg owns the fastest verified quarter-mile and half-mile runs ever logged by a production car.

What’s even crazier is how the Jesko pulled it off. Forget all-wheel drive and sticky drag strips – this beast did it with rear-wheel drive, regular production tires, and an unprepped runway. No special tricks, just raw speed.

Good News for Existing Owners

The record run wasn’t just a flex. Koenigsegg says the record-setting numbers came down to new software tweaks. And instead of keeping the magic to themselves, they’re rolling out the update to all Jesko Absolut owners via over-the-air updates. So, if you’re one of the one-percenters already housing one in a temperature-controlled, multi-car warehouse, you might be about to get even faster – no wrenches required.

The Jesko Absolut is already rubbing shoulders with the hypercar elite. Under the hood sits a twin-turbo 5.0-liter V8 that cranks out up to 1,600 horsepower on E85. Unlike the track-hungry Jesko Attack, the Absolut ditches downforce for slippery aerodynamics and even more top speed.

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Porsche has reclaimed the record for the fastest lap time for a four-door production car at the iconic Nürburgring race track in Germany, less than a year after losing the mantle to China’s Xiaomi, one of the world’s leading smartphone companies.

The Xiaomi’s SU7 Ultra model, a tri-motor high-performance electric sedan, took the title last June, but Porsche has returned to the track with another special edition of the electric Taycan, shaving 10 seconds off Xiaomi’s time, and completing the lap in under 6 minutes 56 seconds on the almost 21 km track.

Kevin Giek, the head of the Taycan model line said the new Manthey Kit offers a “unique upgrade” for the Taycan Turbo GT. “The small but impactful project team from Manthey and Porsche has succeeded in transferring the Manthey DNA into a kit for electric vehicles. This effort has culminated in an impressive new Nordschleife record,” he said.

This lap record post got mixed comments with some congratulating the sports car brand and said: “Congrats Porsche! ” Others compared it to the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra and said: “That’s actually pathetic considering this [Xiaomi SU7 Ultra] is only 9 seconds behind while costing ⅓ the price”.

The latest lap run with the Manthey Kit adds further performance to the 4-door sedan and has performed even better than the Weissach package it had used previously, which helped the car do the same lap in 7 minutes and 7 seconds.

The kit includes quite a few components, covering aerodynamic parts like the massive rear carbon-fibre wing, front diffuser, rear carbon aero discs to help reduce drag. These parts alone will help triple the downforce over the standard model.

Other components included cassis and suspension tuning as well as lighter 21-inch forged wheels, paired with street-legal wider tyres.

According to Porsche, the car that got that lap time was fitted with special track tyres, Pirelli P Zero Trofeo RS, which likely provided better grip around corners. 

On the braking front, the kit includes a larger braking system, performance brake pads for a significant bump in deceleration rate.

Powering was also increased with maximum discharge current from the battery being increased, helping with a 10-second Attack Mode, where 730 kW of power is available. 

The latest lap time from Porsche in the Taycan Turbo GT with Manthey Kit appears to be in a highly modified car, which does not meet the “production” car description in our eyes. 

We look forward to seeing what Xiaomi counters this with; after all, it’s the SU7 Ultra Prototype that lapped the same circuit in under 6 minutes and 23 seconds, over 30 seconds faster than the latest Porsche.

Porsche Taycan Turbo GT lap

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Riz is the founder of carloop based in Melbourne, specialising in Australian EV data, insight reports and trends. He is a mechanical engineer who spent the first 7 years of his career building transport infrastructure before starting carloop. He has a passion for cars, particularly EVs and wants to help reduce transport emissions in Australia. He currently drives a red Tesla Model 3.

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