We don’t have a misunderstanding. You made a reductive argument, got challenged, and now you’re acting like invoking “basic physics” makes the engineering irrelevant.

Run your own scenario honestly. Holding 50 kph up a 6-degree grade with six adults is a high sustained wheel-power demand. If a vehicle only has 14 kW of continuous usable wheel power, ICE or EV, it probably is not doing that.

But that does not make the powertrain irrelevant. That is exactly the point you keep missing.

In an ICE vehicle, the rated power depends on RPM, gearing, transmission losses, and whether the engine can stay in its power band. In an EV, usable output depends on the motor, controller, battery, thermal limits, gearing, and peak-vs-continuous power. Those are not interchangeable systems just because the same physics applies to both.

So no, reducing the question to horsepower does not make sense. Reducing it to torque does not make sense either. That is just car-brained ICE framing.

The powertrain design is the point. Treating ICE, EV, horses, and flywheels as interchangeable for a real vehicle-performance question is not STEM literacy.

The right answer here is to buy one of these, for both of us to go to mexico and make two freinds each, go to an appropriate hill, and give it a shot.