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

With 1,050 horsepower, the new Grand Touring Performance edition becomes the most powerful version of Lucid’s electric Air sedan.

The Air luxury sedan is a new edition of the popular electric vehicle.

The starting price for the Lucid Air Grand Touring Performance is $179,000. The company's Air sedan has impressed critics in many ways since its launch last fall, in part for the amazing performance of the Dream Edition.

It wasn't easy to get that model. The production of the Dream Edition was capped at 520, all of which were spoken for for months before the first Airs were shipped.

The Grand Touring Performance won't be as limited in production as the Dream Edition is.

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

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

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

The new model was developed quickly because of its vertical integration. Most large automakers rely on third-party suppliers for the components of their electric motor and battery packs.

The supply-chain challenges that have hit nearly all automakers around the world resulted in performance adjustments to the Grand Touring Performance. The new Air is 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-performingTesla in a lot of ways. The Model S Plaid was launched last year with a starting price of $130,000 and a claimed zero to 60 time of 1.99 seconds.

The Grand Touring Performance is a more powerful version of the Grand Touring. The model has begun shipping.

The new Grand Touring Performance model will be arriving in the US in June.