Voyah, the premium brand of the Dongfeng group, has recreated a vehicle stunt from a commercial nearly two decades ago with their latest electric vehicle. The Voyah Passion S electric SUV drove a loop inside a tunnel, in what Dongfeng claims was a real stunt using a stock car, with no modifications. Only ramps were placed within the tunnel to allow it to form a loop for the car to drive on.

The stunt is a tribute to one attempted by Mercedes-Benz in 2010. Back then, Mercedes-Benz showed their new SLS AMG sports car driving a loop inside of a tunnel. The stunt was attempted to prove that the vehicle is fast enough to drive upside down for a brief moment, aided by the centrifugal force of the tunnel to allow the vehicle to continue to drive even when upside down. The video featured Michael Schumacher and was shot to announce his return to Formula 1, this time under the Mercedes-Benz F1 team. Despite the incredible feat, the commercial was revealed to be the product of editing trickery, with the car not actually completing the loop, and even more egregiously, was not driven by Michael Schumacher.

This more recent attempt was performed by Voyah, a premium vehicle brand under the Dongfeng Group, as part of its promotions for its latest upcoming model, the Passion S electric SUV.

According to its Weibo page, Dongfeng has gladly acknowledged that it was inspired by the original Mercedes-Benz ad. Unlike its inspiration, the company claims the stunt was performed for real. The automaker chose a closed test tunnel in Wuhan as the venue. The vehicle was a stock Voyah Passion S EV.

Its engineers calculated that the car had to hit the first ramp in the tunnel with a steering angle of exactly 16-degrees while traveling at roughly 130 kilometers per hour. This figure would guarantee that the centrifugal force would keep the car’s wheels on the tunnel’s surface (even when upside down).

Dongfeng later released a longer one-take video, as part of its efforts to prove that the stunt was indeed performed for real. The longer video shows engineers simulating the stunt in the computer, with a toy car, and eventually preparing the actual tunnel for the stunt, along with a veritable army of firemen, firetrucks, and medical emergency vehicles.

The commercial itself was all part of the automaker’s plans to launch the new Passion S. The vehicle is powered by an 800-volt, 98-kilowatt-hour battery pack that enables a CLTC-rated range of 740-km for the two-wheel-drive version, and up to 630-km for the dual-motor all-wheel drive version. The latter delivers 637 horsepower and can spring from 0-100-km/h in 4.5 seconds. It rides on sports car-like double-wishbone in front and a five-link all-aluminum independent suspension at the rear, with electronically controlled dampers and air springs.

It also boasts of a quad-lidar advanced driver assistance system that makes use of 33 sensors. Inside, there’s a pair of 15.6-inch displays and a 29-inch augmented reality heads-up display. It is also 5C charging compatible, capable of recharging from 20% to 80% in ten minutes. For now, the Voyah Passion S is only available in China.