Upward thrust? So these guys are geniuses, and all the F1 teams spending millions of dollars to get the most downforce are idiots. Yeah, ok. Heh.

Erm...lifting motors just lift, they do not reduce weight, or more importantly, mass. That cart will weigh exactly as much as it did with the fans shut off, so its mass remains the same, along with its theoretical acceleration. Unfortunately with less weight on the wheels, traction is reduced and those lift fans become useless--and heavy--appendages. I applaud this company, but I give them little chance of success, at least until their engineer gets some remedial physics training.

As for F1 teams, they used fan technology as did the first fan car, the Chaparral, back in 1970 or so. They used it for downforce not lift.
The point is every organizing body in the world had banned fans by 1975 BECAUSE THEY WORKED SO WELL!
I have no idea whether the lift fans actually work or not but at $60,000 I hope no one is dumb enough to find out. Stupid is as stupid does.

0-60mph in one second would still not be the fastest vehicle in existence. A top fuel dragster would still beat this on its way to 300+ mph. The upward lift part of this story doesn't make any sense either. Downward force is needed for traction. Only the forward thrust would help.

Ooops! Upward thrust to reduce mass? Ducted fans to improve acceleration from a standstill? Both are, to say it in the most sensible way possible, not the first choice of the educated engineer. C'mon New Atlas, this is way below your capabilities. Please take your readers seriously and apply a minimum of review before publishing.

Yeah - that's -
Laughable.

In RC planes, EDFs are notorious for the lack of instant thrust, being likened to a turbo in that they have to build up before hitting their stride. They'll barely have kicked in before your desired sprint time is up. Quick compressed gas blast out the back perhaps?

@Bruce Curtis. The fans do not reduce the mass but they do reduce the weight. Weight is a force which is the mass times the effect of gravitation at that point. The lifting fans counteract the effect of gravitation therefore the weight is reduced, the mass always stays the same. Maybe it's not the engineer who needs the remedial physics training. Having said that, I agree with other posters that reducing the down-force in this way is probably counter-productive.

All comments and the author hit the mark on lift vs down force but the president of the company sees this concept flying someday so right there he completely changes the technology from earth traction reaction mass into atmospheric reaction mass. With the downforce and or weight being required for traction the oddly out of place lifting fans help nothing with acceleration but,, not believing they can be so stupid, maybe they have an idea floating [pun intended] that after you use all the earth reaction mass traction you can get from the rear drive wheels,, by next removing weight on front wheels you lower friction and its drag, but,,, directional control goes out with it without any aerodynamic directional control rudders up front.

"According to the company, that means the 200-kg (441-lb) kart performs as if it weighed just 100 kg (220 lb)." Newton's Second Law- F=Ma, force = Mass x acceleration, weight being the product of 'a'- acceleration due to gravity 9.81m/sec/sec. So it seems to me that 'performs as if it weighed just 100 kg' is misleading; to accelerate it forward requires the same FORCE whatever the weight, because MASS is the limiting factor. Or is my school physics in error?