When you think of electric vehicles, chances are nothing particularly exciting comes to mind. But the Tesla Model S begs to differ, having already beaten a BMW M5 in a drag race earlier this year while offering the best all-electric range you can buy today. So Road & Track decided to find out what happens if you disable the traction control and get a little carried away with the throttle.

The traction control in the Model S isn’t normally defeatable, but R&T pulled a fuse out of the car. This disabled the ABS, ESP and traction control. Unfortunately, removing the fuse also killed the power steering and vacuum brake assist, so they didn’t dare try their hand at any high-speed maneuvers. But at low-speeds, the chassis lying underneath the electronic assists is said to be superb.

However, because electric cars have no rev-limiter, you have to be awfully careful with your right foot. Anytime you get wheelspin, the driving wheels will continue spinning right up to the 132 mph top speed if you just mash the throttle – that kind of wheelspin will very quickly result in a blowout. Thankfully, the R&T folks avoided such an incident when they filmed the excellent burnout below.

Source: Road and Track