100th VW Golf GTI TCR Delivery – Video
What’s at the very heart of the Volkswagen GTI DNA? A more than 40-year tradition of sportiness and reliability! It’s therefore hardly surprising that the motorsport spin-off Golf GTI TCR is entirely on course for success too. For a good two years now, it has been proving its worth around the world as a competitive vehicle in the relatively new TCR series dedicated to touring car motorsport.
The sporty Golf GTI TCR was guaranteed a fascinated audience when the 100th of its kind was delivered on 23 March 2018: it is by no means an everyday event to witness the roadworthy touring racer automatically glide out of one of the two glass delivery towers before covering the final few metres down the lane of the delivery pavilion under its own steam, emitting a throaty sound from its exhaust as it goes. There’s no doubt about it – even when parked between two brand-new, sparkling Golf GTI1 road models, this exceptional, highly polished white sports car is the undisputed star of the show on this spring morning. The new owner of vehicle number 100 is the racing team owner Franz Engstler. This car fanatic from the Allgäu region, who was a successful Touring car driver earlier, put the very first Golf GTI TCR into racing use and was obviously not going to miss out on the opportunity to collect this special touring car himself.
The broad-shouldered bodywork is unmistakably Golf, yet fascinatingly different at the same time. In line with the update to the series models, the Golf GTI TCR was given a subtle facelift in the form of a new front and fresh LED tail lights. The protruding GFRP wheel arches are especially striking: the body kit is a functional eye-catcher and further emphasises the typical Golf shoulders and the broad C-pillar profile. It offers the voluminous 260-66 R18 racing tyres and the substantially wider toe compared with the series Golf plenty of room for manoeuvre. The impressive TCR aluminium wing with a splitter adds the finishing aerodynamic touch and ensures that the front-wheel drive vehicle’s stability is maintained, even when pushed to the limits in racing. The dimensions have also increased – a total length of 4.60 metres (including the spoiler) and round about 15 centimetres more width make the Golf GTI TCR a large-calibre racer.
The 2018 version of the Volkswagen Golf GTI TCR is naturally another direct descendant of the series production model. Its bodyshell is painstakingly optimised by internal motorsport experts under the supervision of Volkswagen Motorsport. It takes three weeks for individual parts ranging from the undercarriage to the roof to be specifically reinforced for motorsport use and upgraded with elements such as an integrated safety cell, a racing seat with head protectors and an FIA-compliant safety tank, all in accordance with the FIA’s stringent homologation rules. The chassis has been redesigned for track use, but sticks to the series production assembly points