R1S SUV

Make
Rivian
Segment
SUV

Everyone loves a good drag race. So what happens when you pit the three fastest SUVs this side of the Tesla Model X against each other?

Jason Cammisa found out. Well, he found out that the Porsche Cayenne GT doesn't like to lose, that Rivian needs street tires and a diet to win a drag race, and that the Aston Martin DBX707 is damn near as fast as the Porsche.

Why? That's the beauty of Cammisa's drag races. We all get to find out why and how the results of a race shook out. Take the Rivian R1S. The journalist estimates the R1S is losing a quarter of a second to its off-road tires, whereas the Porsche's are basically road-legal racing slicks.

The R1S also loses because Rivian says it has to. The car is equipped with a 110 mph speed limiter, which with 835 hp and 908 lb-ft of torque, it hits quickly. Meanwhile, the Cayenne GT is stupidly fast. Cammisa claims it would smoke a Carrera GT to 60 and in the quarter mile. You can see those figures below. Impressively, it does so while being down 66 horsepower to the Aston DBX707.

Still, the Aston is incredibly quick. According to Cammisa, it loses only because of chance and tires. If one driver had jumped the Cayenne on one run, the result would be different. On top of that, the Cayenne GT's 85 treadwear tires are far racier than the 707's 280 treadwear tires.

On top of the lost traction due to its aggressive off-road tires, the Rivian takes an L here because its launch control software isn't on par with two of the best performance automakers on the planet. Porsche, in particular, has ludicrously good launch software.

So, the Hagerty crew got a Maserati MC20 hoping to find something to beat the Porsche. It didn't work-the two tie. The MC20 can't get the power down due to its lack of driven wheels, catching up to the GT at around 100 mph. However, it was 11 mph faster. We're cool with losing a drag race as long as the loser looks like the MC20.