Audi has channeled the spirit of its most legendary race cars for a wild one-off concept that celebrates 50 years of the firm’s venerable five-cylinder engine.
The new GT50 concept is the latest creation from Audi’s Neckarsulm-based apprentices, who each year create an outlandish one-off concept that pays tribute to a historic model or hints at a future programme.
Previous instalments include the radical RS6 GTO concept (which became the limited-production RS6 GT), a 236bhp reworking of the NSU Prinz and last year’s A2 E-tron electro-mod, which reimagined the millennial supermini with modern cues and EV power – all of them marking important Audi anniversaries.
Revealed in a video taken by Audi and published by German site Stimme (below), This year’s concept was chosen to celebrate a half-century of five-cylinder Audis, with 1976 marking 50 years since the launch of the second-generation Audi 100, the first mass-production car to use an inline five.
It is among the least common engine formats used in mass production, and Audi is the only manufacturer in the world still using the arrangement in its cars – with Volvo, Ford, Land Rover and Volkswagen long ago having ended production of their own versions.
Today, Audi only uses a straight-five engine in the RS3, and it is that AWD hot hatch that forms the basis of the new GT50.
The apprentices have completely transformed the RS3 into an homage to some of the most successful five-cylinder Audi race cars of all time – namely the 90 Quattro IMSA GTO and 200 Quattro Trans-Am, which saw huge success racing stateside in the 1980s a§nd 1990s.
The GT50 pays tribute to these icons of motorsport in its blocky, three-box silhouette; minimalist, aero-optimised surfacing; retro visual cues like the old-style front grille; and – perhaps most obviously – the huge turbofan-style wheel designs.
No specifications for the concept have been given, but it uses the same 394bhp 2.5-litre turbocharged five-pot as the standard RS3.
Audi is expected to further celebrate the five-cylinder next year with a new track-honed special edition of the RS3, potentially based Performance Edition and packing more power than the Mercedes-AMG A45 to make it the world’s most powerful ICE hot hatch.
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