There are heroes in fantasy and in real life. Ayrton Senna was a real one for motorsports fans. He won so many times in Silverstone that the track was nicknamed Silvastone, a reference to the pilot’s last name. Batman faces criminals in fiction, what makes him a movie and comics hero. Nonetheless, sometimes fantasy and real life heroes’ lives meet. Silvastone, or, better saying, Silverstone was the stage for this meeting. The same tarmac that has seen Senna win has also received a piece of Batman this week, the piece World Car Fans like the most: the Batmobile.

Panasonic Toyota Racing and Warner Bros. Pictures have made a partnership to show Batman’s vehicle at the British Grand Prix and, last Thursday, it even ran a little on the track beside a TF108, Toyota’s F1 car. The idea was to celebrate the close release of the movie “The Dark Knight”, a sequence to “Batman Begins”, the last movie performed by Heath Ledger. Although many movie vehicles are not functional, the current Batmobile, as well as the previous one, which was recently for sale at eBay, runs on unleaded fuel.

Weighing 2.5 tons, the Dark Knight’s ride is 4.5 m long, 3 m wide at its widest point and 1.5 m high. With six wheels, the vehicle does not have a front axle. Its two front wheels are fitted to a sort of “fork”, what, according to the press release, allows the car “to make extremely tight turns”. The four other wheels, with monster truck tyres, are at the back. Batmobile is also able to jump 1.2 m to 1.8 m. It has already jumped a distance of 18 m. Hero’s car stuff…

The movie will be released on 25 July. No need to say Batman will manage to beat the bad guys and keep alive to continue saving the world. It is a pity real life heroes not always manage to do the same.