You can’t fault James Glickenhaus for dreaming big. The man, after all, is known in automotive circles for pushing the envelope in ways that very few people with his means are inclined to do. It started when he brought to the world the P4/5, a Pininfarina-created, Ferrari Enzo-bodied racer that enjoyed tremendous success in races all over the world. From there, Glickenhaus set out on expanding his lineup of performance machines, first with the SCG003C before following that up with the SCG003CS. Now, the third iteration of Glickenhaus’ vision is making its presence felt at the 2017 Geneva Motor Show. The model is called the SCG0003S, and it’s an 800-horsepower, road-going supercar of unbridled fury.
The debut of the SCG003S will create headlines. That much I can guarantee considering its capabilities on the both the road and track. Glickenhaus himself says that his new pride and joy is capable of blasting around the Nürburgring in 6:30, a time that would easily make it the new lap king of the track. By almost all metrics, the SCG003S is going to be a handful to deal with for all the right reasons.
But there’s also something more meaningful about the SCG003S, and it has very little to do with form or function. The supercar, for all intents and purposes, is the culmination of an ambitious goal set out by its creator when he first thought of the idea of asking Pininfarina to rebid his Ferrari Enzo and turn it into the P4/5. It seems like a long time ago, but through grit, hard work, and determination, Glickenhaus is well on his way to achieving his goals.
Make no mistake, though; the man is far from settled. The SCG003S, as awesome as it looks and sounds, isn’t Glickenhaus’ end-game. Once the car is launched, the plan is to sell at least three cars a year at a price of $1.8 million for each unit, all while setting the long-term goal of competing in the GTE category of the 24 Hours of Le Mans with the SCG003. Think the SCG003 would be out of its depth in Le Mans? Yeah, try telling James Glickenhaus that.
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There’s more to the SCG003S than just pure emotion
At the risk of getting too caught up in the emotions of seeing the achievements of James Glickenhaus and his team, let’s deviate for a minute and take a look at the SCG003S in all its resplendent glory.
The car itself is a work of engineering art. At the very least, it looks like an evolved version of its predecessors, even though you can tell that there are still some elements of the P4/5 in it, particularly the use of the bare carbon fiber elements. Meanwhile, the interior of the car is still devoid of bespoke elements although it is a little less hardcore than the cars that came before it. It does have a digital dash, a removable steering wheel, full race harnesses, and mounting points to a full roll cage, which prospective owners can use to install one in the event they want to take the car out on the race track.
It looks like an evolved version of its predecessors, even though you can tell that there are still some elements of the P4/5 in it, particularly the use of the bare carbon fiber elements.
Let it be said, then that Glickenhaus’ supercars have never been about luxury, but rather, a pure pursuit of extraordinary performance. That much you can tell with the car’s 4.4-liter twin-turbo V-8 engine capable of producing 800 horsepower and 627 pound-feet of torque. Think those numbers are impressive? Well, get a load of these figures. In full flight, SCG claims that the 003S is capable of generating as much as 1,550 pounds of downforce at 155 mph and more than 2.5 lateral Gs in corners while still being capable of clearing 60 mph in less than three seconds before topping out at a speed of 217 mph. Rest assured, driving this car isn’t as easy as simply sitting behind the steering wheel and pushing the pedal to the metal.
There’s no word yet on when SCG plans to take the 003S out for a spin around the Nürburgring, but when it does, it’s going there with the full intent of smashing the Lamborghini Huracán Performante’s 6:52.01 lap time. And since Glickenhaus claims that it can do in 6:30, you can be sure that a lot of eyes will be on the 003S when it makes its record-setting pursuit around the Green Hell.