What it was like to race a VW New Beetle Cup car | From the Archives

The Cars

Unlike the standard U.S.-spec passenger cars, New Beetle Cup rac­ers are powered by a 204-horsepower VR6 engine. A deep front spoiler, fat fenders, special rear apron and rear wing are added to the standard­issue bodywork, while huge OZ wheels cover ATE racing brakes.

Normally this series, which originated in Germany in 1999, is held during the IO rounds of the German Super Touring Car Cham­pionship. The Volkswagen New Beetle race cars are prepared and maintained centrally by Volkswagen Racing in Hanover, Germany, thus allowing drivers who can't establish and maintain their own teams to participate. To be part of the New Beetle Cup, competi­tors must pay 100,000 Deutschemarks (plus VAT). In return, Volkswagen offers half a million Deutschemarks as prize money.

At Road Atlanta, the New Beetle Cup race was a celebrity event of sorts, with assorted actors, racers of note and members of the automo­tive press mixing it up on track, raising money for local charities. Those mix-ups (and crashes) resulted in only a handful of green-flag race laps in a scheduled 30-minute contest, but it's not every day that one gets to see Tim Allen, Hans Stuck, Jack Baldwin, Brian Redman and Danny Sullivan on track at the same time.

Driving Impressions

Among the notable drivers present at the Road Atlanta New Beetle Cup race was Road & Track editor Andy Bornhop. He found the Euro-spec VR6 engine to produce excellent power and torque, although the six-speed gearbox was a little awkward at first. "I buzzed the engine once–without damage–when I accidentally went from fourth to third instead of fourth to fifth," he admitted.

As expected, the suspension was much more like that of a race car than a street car. "The suspension tuning felt fairly firm, and when we were busy warming the tires on the warm-up lap, I could see that most cars were picking up their inside rears an inch or so off the ground," Andy explained. "The slicks, which I had never raced upon before, offered excellent grip when warm. When cold, well, they're slick."

Andy never had a problem with the over­sized ATE brakes, even at the end of the back straight, where the cars had to go from flat­out in sixth gear down to third for Turn I OA. "They never got soft, and I never invoked ABS," he explained. "Had I been a little quicker, maybe I'd have needed it."

As expected by many, the professional drivers really made the best of the race-pre­pared New Beetles. "Some people claimed that Stuck had a 'special' car, but I think he's just a special driver who picks the car up by the scruff of the neck and makes it do miraculous things.

"As for me, I'm not pleased with my per­formance, as I never felt like I found a rhythm," Andy said. "Every time I went out, I was among the first cars on the track–because of the way the cars were parked in the ga­ rage–so I felt like I had to drive using my rear-view the whole time and not learning the track. It showed in my times. But boy how I would love to do it again.