Someone had better get a wet vac to our office, stat, because upon seeing Volkswagen’s just-unveiled Golf-based race car concept, drool flowed in torrents. Torrents, people! Besides looking like a GTI that’s gone on an intake bender, pumped up its guns at the gym, and popped some roll-cage Viagra, the Golf’s most notable feature is that it’s just a Golf, sort of. There is no “R” badging anywhere, and Volkswagen stresses that the race car is simply a heavily modified, good ol’ Golf, and it’s front-wheel drive!
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Created to evaluate Volkswagen’s possible participation in the new Touring Car Racer International Series (TCR), the Golf TCR concept is less “concept car” than full-blown, ready-to-race race car. It routes 330 horsepower from a turbocharged 2.0-liter four (okay, the engine was borrowed from the Golf R) to the front wheels via a six-speed DSG dual-clutch automatic. The chassis is 40 cm wider—that’s a mind-blowing 15.75 inches!—a move we assume was made for greater stability and to make room for those ultra-wide 18-inch wheels, but perhaps some German in VW’s motorsports division decided “eet looks very, very cool, yah.”
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- 2015 Golf R Tested: VW’s Champion Square-Dancer Gets Faster
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- 2015 Volkswagen Golf SportWagen TDI Tested: Is There a More Well-Rounded Vehicle?
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- Volkswagen Golf Research: Full Pricing, Specs, Photos, Reviews, and More
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The front and rear bumpers feature gaping vents and intakes seemingly inspired by the wild-looking Volkswagen Design Vision GTI concept from 2013, augmented by a carbon-fiber splitter and a towering rear wing. Inside, there’s a full safety cage, a racing seat with harnesses, and a minimum of carpet, interior plastics, or visual banality. If Volkswagen’s evaluation of this concept car is successful, we could see customer cars just like it race in TCR in 2016. We’d absolutely love to take a spin in this front-drive monster someday, but in the meantime maybe we could replicate those fender flares and that wing on our long-term Golf test car? Everybody knows a giant wing gives any car a 5–160-hp bump. It’s just science.
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Source: Car and Driver Blog http://ift.tt/1UF03O8
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