Acceleration

Road & Track Standing mile test, Sept. 2005

Car	speed	time	bhp	weight lbs.
Hennessey Venom 1000 Twin Turbo Viper	210	25.6	1000	3,450
Nascar (not part of R&T test)	212		850	3,400
Formula 1 (not part of R&T test)	230		740	1,334
Lola-Ford Cosworth Champ Car *	203	24.2	800	1,575
Pontiac-Riley Mk XI Daytona Prototype	180	27.8	525	2,250
Jaguar XKR Trans-Am	180	28.0	650
Vortech Mustang GT	179	30.4	575
Chevrolet Corvette	154	32.7	400	3,290

Note: Although the Viper and Stock Cars may be able to go faster in a straight line, the lighter weight, better braking, gearing for acceleration, aerodynamics and ground effects of the Champ cars, Daytona Prototype and Trans-Am cars make them faster on road courses.

* Indy Cars can be faster. In 2000, Gil de Ferran set the one-lap qualifying record of 241.426 mph at California Speedway.
Indy cars which race mainly on ovals generally have faster top speeds than F1 cars, because the F1 cars which race on road courses have more down force for better cornering.

See Speed Comparison at the Auto Racing Page.

Notes:
Most cars tires will provide .7 - .8 Gs of radial acceleration before they break loose. Sports cars with racing tireswill get around 1 G.
A F1 racer can get up to 3.5 G because of down force produced by ground effects and wings.
At 60 MPH (88 ft./sec.) 1 G of centrifugal force will occur at a radius of 240 ft. (r = 88^2/32.2).

* Note: There are a lot of web sites which state that a top fuel dragster will reach 200 MPH before half track and in order to do this the launch acceleration approaches 8Gs.
This is not correct. If you do the math 0-200 in 1/8 mi. averages 2 Gs. The tires would likely spin before it could produce that much force given that a F1 racecar with 4 tires can only support a maximum 5Gs under braking even with the extra down force.