When French automaker Darracq built its first 100-horsepower vehicle, it was monumental. Factory driver Paul Baras, on a stretch of road in western Belgium, would hit 104.5 miles per hour—a new benchmark for land speed worldwide.

 

More than 120 years later, there isn’t a single new car sold in the US with less than 100 hp. Huge strides in modern combustion engineering and the breakneck pace of battery-electric development mean that not even America’s cheapest, slowest vehicles are that dreadfully underpowered.