2022 in Review: Testing Winners and Losers

With the influx of electric vehicles come many new quirks, including that the stated horsepower figures, which are often impressively large (the better to overcome the vehicles’ massive curb weights), are often fleeting and don’t mean what they do in internal-combustion land. Compare, for example, the Audi e-tron GT, whose 522 combined horsepower propel it to an 11.9-second quarter-mile at 119 mph, with the 751-hp Mercedes-AMG EQS, which is but a half-second quicker and no faster after 1320 feet of putting foot to the floor. Sure, the Benz is heavier, but the power-to-weight ratio suggests it should be about a half-second swifter through the quarter-mile. To 130 mph, the two are within a tenth of each other, the AMG’s extra 229 horses yielding it practically bupkis.