EV maker Lucid debuts its latest Tesla rival, a high-performance luxury sedan with a 446-mile range

Electric vehicle maker Lucid is debuting a new edition of its popular and powerful Air luxury sedan.

The Lucid Air Grand Touring Performance, announced Tuesday, will ship with 1,050 horsepower and a starting price tag of $179,000. The company’s Air sedan has impressed critics in many ways since its launch last fall, in part for the astounding performance of the 1,111 horsepower Dream Edition.

But that model wasn’t easy to get. Lucid capped production of the Dream Edition to just 520 examples, all of which were spoken for months before Lucid began shipping the first Airs from its Arizona factory last October.

Lucid said Tuesday the Grand Touring Performance — with specifications that very nearly match the Dream Edition and a starting price just $10,000 higher — won’t be as limited in production.

While the Air has made a big impression at the high end of the luxury EV market, Lucid is still in the early stages of production. The company said in late February that it had built about 400 vehicles since starting production last September, and that it had about 25,000 reservations for the Air.

It now expects to deliver between 12,000 and 14,000 vehicles in 2022, down from a prior forecast of 20,000 as global supply-chain disruptions have slowed the ramp-up of Air production.

Lucid CEO Peter Rawlinson said that the company moved to develop the higher-performance model after realizing that there was still considerable demand for a range-topping Air with a four-figure horsepower rating.

Lucid was able to develop the new model quickly because of its “vertical integration,” Rawlinson said. Lucid develops and builds its own electric motors and battery packs in-house, rather than relying on third-party suppliers for the components as do most large automakers.

Performance adjustments to the Grand Touring Performance are a result of the supply-chain challenges that have hit nearly all automakers around the world. But the new Air’s specs are still impressive:

• Zero to 60 miles per hour in just 2.6 seconds (versus a claimed 2.5 seconds for the high-performance version of the Dream Edition.)
• EPA-estimated range of 446 miles (versus 471 miles for the high-performance Dream Edition.)
• Lucid’s advanced driver-assist system, DreamDrive Pro, standard with much of the hardware that will be needed for fully autonomous driving, including a lidar sensor.
• Lucid’s super-quick 900-volt charging system, which allows a user to add up to 300 miles of range in just 21 minutes at a 350 kilowatt DC Fast charger, also standard.

The new Air beats the highest-performing Tesla in most ways, but not in acceleration. Tesla’s Model S Plaid launched last year with 1,020 horsepower, EPA-estimated range of 396 miles, a starting price just over $130,000 – and a claimed zero to 60 time of 1.99 seconds.

The Grand Touring Performance is a higher-performance variant of the previously-announced Lucid Air Grand Touring, which claims 819 horsepower. That model has begun shipping, Lucid said on Tuesday.

U.S. deliveries of the new Grand Touring Performance model will begin in June.