Turn the ignition, wait for the dash mounted lights to flicker and then prod the starter button. The noise that erupts is prodigious, assaulting the atmosphere and deep-throating the ear canals of all those present. Naked of any luxury, the interior is stark, with all the gloss of the standard KZ1 peeled back to reveal the sinuous texture of bare carbon fibre and polished shards of machined aluminium. Snick the tall gear-leaver in to first, dial up a handful of revs and trundle towards the start line.

We nervously eye up our opponent; a heavily fettled Porsche GT2. A series of slick mental calculations later and the battle of statistics have already been won, at least on paper. It’s only when the hand of the starter signals go that we get to find out if the statistics translate into battleground dominance. The waiting is over, it’s time for VMAX.

I gather my senses and hang on as the speedo reacts as if on some amphetamine hit. Scenery collapsing behind us like some Hollywood disaster finale, the next gear slots home and the nuclear like reaction continues.

We’re rapidly approaching the first corner, a long drawn out affair with a double apex for good measure. It’s here where the race for the timing lights really begins. Carry enough speed and two miles later, as you burst through the electronic timing lights, VMAX should have been reached, that moment of motoring Nirvana we usually can only dream about; maximum speed. It’s not going to happen this time. Losing out to the Porsche, we saunter past the timing lights at a leisurely 148mph. Some 50mph short of VMAX, there’s certainly room for improvement.

Back in the pits, the team think they’ve got it sussed. The Academy car was last driven in anger at a track day event, an occasion when it was more important to go fast around the twisty bits rather than the straights that joined them. This meant the huge rear wing and protruding chin spoiler were set for maximum down force; an unfathomably technical term which simply means the car was being forced down into the tarmac by the airflow over the car. The solution; lower the wing a fraction and give the front spoiler a nudge backwards. It certainly worked.

The numbers spiralled with each run. 169mph…175mph…….181mph……..and then the fastest of the day, 189mph. The feeling at such speeds is intense. Just keeping the car in a straight line requires strength and focus on a Herculean scale. Blink and you’ve travelled several hundred yards, sneeze and you’re in the next county.  We never were going to hit VMAX, the runway simply wasn’t long enough to engage sixth gear. That didn’t matter. For the Ascari team, the day was proof enough that in the KZ1, they had a car capable of humbling even the most established names in the business.

I later took a ride in a device from the German supercar stable. The way it swept through the gears, searing towards the rev limiter before the semi-automatic gearbox upped the ratio and began the machine wash cycle all over again was epic. Yet strip away all the thrills afforded by a two mile runway and it suddenly hits home that you’re a mere a passenger, tasked only with planting your right foot and twirling that round thing in front of you.

The Ascari is different. Rather than bore with clinical, military like precision, it entertains with a raffish character and a purity of design that remains distinctively vinyl in an increasingly iPod age. It’s not supercar perfection, we’ll happily leave that to Germans with the 911. Instead, the Ascari acts as a living, breathing exhibit of Britain’s flamboyant and gloriously rich supercar industry. The KZ1 is stupendously quick, achingly beautiful and exquisitely finished. What’s more, if Jürgen decides to get lippy about his precision Porsche, just remind him who won the war……twice. 

Performance figures