It’s Worthersee time again and Volkswgen fans must be wondering what Wolfsburg has cooked up this year?
The answer of course is another special edition, the Golf GTI TCR, in celebration of the car’s two wins in the now superseded TCR race series.
The road going TCR pumps out 213kW and 370Nm of torque, with an unfettered top speed of more than 260km/h.
Worthersee if you haven’t been there, is a lake in Austria where the fun loving Germans (we call them bogans) gather in a little town called Reifnitz to celebrate the car they love each year.
Think Bathurst or any of the “V8 Supercar” fixtures and you’ll get the picture (sorry, it’s not V8s anymore).
Some 7300 cars and 125,000 people are expected to turn out for the picturesque lakeside event.
That’s lots of cars, lots of drinking and lots of bare-chested young men with tatoos doing laps of honour.
Their big moment comes Wednesday, May 9, when the reportedly near-production-ready Golf GTI TCR makes its public debut.
Destined to sit at the top of the GTI range, the car is due to go on sale at the end of the year (no word on whether we’ll get it yet).
The TCR’s turbocharged engine delivers 213kW of power between 5000 and 6800rpm and 370Nm of torque in a flat curve between 1600 and 4300rpm.
A 7-speed dual clutch auto and limited-slip diff help get power to the ground through the front wheels.
Maximum speed is pegged at 250km/h but rises to 264km/h if you opt to remove the electronic speed limiter.
With more than 2.2 million units sold, Golf GTI has become one of the world’s most successful hot hatches.
It all started back in 1976 with the Mark I, an 82kW front-wheel drive hatchback that delivered great dynamics at an affordable price.
Originally, it was planned to build only 5000 cars.
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