Is the 2023 Nissan Z really a disappointment on track?

Zcars have never been known to be quick - could corner well but straight line speed has never been something to right home about.

The design issue I have is the black top on this one. Would look better to me if the entire car was painted yellow. Wonder if the black could be painted. 

Overall the look of the car is good and would be one that having previously owned 2 280's and 1 350 I would consider buying. 

I am wondering if just like the VW Diesel scandal, the ECU senses it's on dyno and therefore delivers the Z's advertised horsepower and torque. On the track, the ECU may cut power to avoid overheating or warranty issues. I would suggest going back to the track with a OBD2 scanner and monitor the TPS sensor to see if the ECU is commanding full throttle.

There's clearly a torque dip in the mid range. Its a true parallel twin turbo motor, not a sequential setup, so I suspect its either a preproduction glitch or this particular car is a little abused from all the journalists flogging it. If not, the torque dip should be able to be tuned out. Maybe there is a hard part in the exhaust or intake causing a weird resonance or restriction at mid rpms? Anyways, it's putting down 350lbs ft to the wheels, so its making more power then advertised. 

When comparing to the Supra though it's important to note 2 things.

1. The Supra is heavily underrated. Dyno runs have shown between about 370 to as high as  425 lb ft to the wheels!

2. HP is really a bad metric to use to measure acceleration and performance. "Power" is the amount of work being done at a given RPM. Its an antiquated metric that had its place in the days when you cared if a vehicle could maintain highway speeds. I think its the marketing people that are keeping it alive today. You make your low output motor make a bit more torque a little higher, and boom you have a higher HP number to sell cars with, but in reality you aren't any faster. Torque is king. HP sells cars, torque wins races, etc. Your torque curve is your acceleration curve. 

In short, the acceleration difference between the Supra and Z makes sense if you look at the torque figures (the Z is heavier too, it is not under 3300lbs as said in the video, about 3500lbs). Plus the Supra is grossly underrated.