Volkswagen
Volkswagen will be taking its best shot at conquering the Pikes Peak hill climb in 2018 in Colorado and they’ll be doing it in a fully-electric car that looks like it was dropped off from sometime in the future.
The specs provided by Volkswagen for the new four-wheel-drive I.D. R Pikes Peak all-electric prototype race car have thus far been pretty limited. We do know that it is part of VW’s new line of concept vehicles and will sit on the same I.D. chassis their other new electric car models will use.
Volkswagen plans to offer more than 20 fully-electric cars by 2025 with the production on the first model of the I.D. family scheduled to start at the end of 2019.
“We want to be at the forefront of electro-mobility with Volkswagen and the I.D. family,” says Volkswagen Member of the Board of Management with responsibility for Development, Dr. Frank Welsch. “Competing in the most famous hillclimb in the world with the I.D. R Pikes Peak is a valuable test for the general development of electric cars.”
Jürgen Stackmann, Member of the Board of Management with responsibility for Sales, Marketing and After Sales, adds: “Pikes Peak is without question the most iconic hillclimb in the world. The I.D. R project represents a fantastic opportunity for Volkswagen to change the conversation about e-mobility, both emotionally and from a sporting perspective.”
The last time Volkswagen entered the Pikes Peak hill climb was back in 1987 in a 652 horsepower, dual-engine Golf and “narrowly missed out on success” on the winding 12.4-mile course.
“It is about time we settled the score,” says Volkswagen Motorsport Director, Sven Smeets. “The I.D. R Pikes Peak represents an extremely exciting challenge for us, to show what is possible in motorsport with an electric drivetrain. The entire team behind our driver Romain Dumas is highly motivated to set a new record for electric cars.”
That record currently stands at 8:57.118, set in 2016 by New Zealand’s Rhys Millen, driving a 1,596 horsepower Drive eO PP100. So there’s no telling how much horsepower will be under the hood of the Volkswagen I.D. R went it hits the Peak on on June 24th, but you can bet it will be a lot.
Volkswagen
The BroBible team writes about gear that we think you want. Occasionally, we write about items that are a part of one of our affiliate partnerships and we will get a percentage of the revenue from sales.