Guys in our area of London every summer would routinely rent reasonably upmarket cars, new BMWs, Mercs, etc. for a few weeks and not just use them to accelerate hard around the roads (though they did) but sit there, out of gear and just floor it for dozens of seconds at a time.

I personally do drive rentals to the max safe performance they will give me, which is more like what the description was about, in any case.