Video footage of Tesla's radical Cybertruck winning a tug-of-war against a Ford F-150 set the car world on fire when it emerged online. While the Blue Oval's perennial best-seller lost the battle, one of the company's employees pointed out the fight wasn't fair, and challenged Tesla to a rematch.
Sunny Madra, the vice president of Ford's X venture incubator, asked Tesla co-founder and CEO Elon Musk to send his team a Cybertruck so that they can stage a rematch on a more level playing field. The F-150 lost by a wide margin, but many pointed the comparison wasn't fair because Tesla selected a relatively basic, rear-wheel drive variant of the truck with a 325-horsepower V6 engine instead of a V8 with more ponies under the hood, or a turbodiesel V6 with gobs of torque. Details about the Cybertruck used in the tug-of war weren't released, but it looks like it got a head start.
Bring it on https://t.co/pCnln1NdRO
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 25, 2019
But now Fox News is reporting that Ford really isn't interested in a rematch. The network quotes a Ford spokeswoman as saying, "Sunny’s tweet was tongue in cheek to point out the absurdity of Tesla’s video, nothing more."
"With America’s best-selling truck for 42 years, we’ve always focused on serving our truck customers regardless of what others say or do. We look forward to our all-new F-150 hybrid coming next year and all-electric F-150 in a few years," the spokeswoman said.
The one true apples-to-apples test, of course, would pit the Tesla against the freight-train towing electric F-150.
Musk didn't acknowledge the first tug-of-war wasn't fair. He simply replied — on Twitter; where else? — "bring it on."
Even Neil deGrasse Tyson got into it, pointing out that the tug-of-war was rigged because the F-150's bed was empty.
We all love Torque. But high Torque just spins a tire in place if there’s not enough weight to provide traction. Fully load the F150, giving highest traction to its rear wheels, then try to drag that up the hill. I otherwise agree: Load both to the max and the highest torque wins
— Neil deGrasse Tyson (@neiltyson) November 26, 2019
The Cybertruck can tow more than the F-150 no matter which version it's tied to. The triple-motor variant boasts a 14,000-pound towing capacity, which is 800 pounds more than the F-150 can muster. But, keep in mind Tesla's full-fat version starts at $69,000, which puts it well into Super Duty territory. Ford's bigger pickup can tow a 37,000-pound gooseneck trailer, or a 24,200-pound conventional trailer. We'd be interested to see how the Cybertruck fares against an F-350 that's about half the price. Oh, and this time make both trucks 4-wheel drive.