YouTuber Gets Sideways with Remapped AMG GT R
Savage AMG GT R packs 650 horses and 590 lb-ft of torque, needs a short leash to keep it on the road.
The AMG GT R is already a beast of a machine. Its handcrafted 4.0-liter twin-turbo V8 drops 577 horsepower out the back to send the sports car to 60 in 3.5 seconds, while the dry sump system keeps everything lubricated around the hard corners, and the composite brakes bring it all to a stop.
And that’s before someone decides to whip out their laptop. YouTuber Sideways Sid recently took out a remapped GT R on some random English roads for a bit of flogging. The results were “savage,” to say the least.
“When did it ever occur to you that [the] Mercedes-AMG GT R needed more power?” asks Sid. “The thing is a bit of a handful already. Well, this particular one does. It’s running a VRS Northampton remap that puts out 650 horsepower and — wait for it — 590 foot-pounds of torque. That’s 800 Newton meters in Euro lingo. Ladies and gentlemen, hold onto your hats. This is gonna get wild.”
The last time Sid was behind the wheel of a GT R was nearly a year before on another YouTube channel, pitting him against the AMG E 63 S. Compared to now, Sid says the cold and wet conditions back then are the same in this video, the perfect scenario for wringing out all that the remapped GT R can give him.
“This AMG GT R can hold a candle to a Porsche GT3,” Sid says, “and it’s the first Mercedes product that can do that… Unlike the GT3, you can use this on a day-to-day basis. For starters, it’s very nice. The automatic gearbox is easy to use… On a cruise, you don’t get that much wind whistle… and you’ve got a rear hatch [so] you can put stuff in it. I’m properly amazed by how usable this car is.”
With the remap, and the GT R set to sport mode with traction control halfway off, Sid finds the car harder to control, though it’s preferable to having it on race mode with the rear-wheel steering on for daily usability on the English B roads, especially when drifting around the corners.
“What I do love about this car is just how usable it is,” Sid says. “You could daily this pretty much all-year round… The ride isn’t too intrusive.”
He adds that there are some downsides to the remap, stating that it’s nice to have a “savage” GT R on tap, “it’s kinda like ‘Ferrari F12 too much,’ which, to most people, would get themselves into a bit of a pickle,” including Sid himself. Once you tame it, though, “it’s a good laugh.”
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