Despite the so-called Armor Glass failing spectacularly during the Cybertruck reveal, Tesla’s electric pickup is still an intimidating vehicle. It’s ginormous. It’s clad in stainless steel. It looks like it just drove through a rip in the space-time continuum from a distant planet where it was used to mow down alien supersoldiers. And yet, Elon Musk appears to be intimidated by another electric truck on the scene.
When a Twitter user recently asked Musk to provide an update on the Cybertruck, which has been delayed slightly, the Tesla CEO tweeted that the “Cybertruck will be almost exactly what was shown,” though the company will be “adding rear wheel steering, so it can do tight turns & maneuver with high agility.”
While a number of automakers offer rear steering on select models, as Roadshow pointed out, the subtext of this tweet is pretty clear: Musk is spooked by the Hummer EV.
Specifically, the Tesla boss seems to be responding to a feature on the upcoming electric “supertrucks” from GMC called CrabWalk, which offers something even more enticing than traditional real-wheel steering; it enables the front and rear wheels to angle 10 degrees right or left so the vehicle can move diagonally. If you’re finding that hard to picture, some people caught the Hummer testing in the wild and it truly must be seen to be believed.
When it comes to pickups — even though electrification is changing the automotive landscape — you can rest assured classic one-upmanship will stick around. GMC wanted to out-crazy Tesla, and now Tesla wants to outperform GMC.
But it remains to be seen whether people actually want these sci-fi trucks, or if they’d rather stick with old faithful.
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