An Electric Lancia Delta With 670bhp Is Heading For World Rallycross

Nearly 30 years after the Lancia retired its immensely successful Group A Delta World Rally Championship machine, the name and the car will make an unlikely return to top-end competition. But not in an official capacity - what you’re looking at here is from a French outfit called GCK Motorsport.

Having already made a ‘Lancia Delta Evo-e’ electric restomod version of Lancia’s famed Delta Integrale all-wheel drive hot hatch, GCK clearly thought it’d be rude not to build a version for the FIA World Rallycross Championship. From 2022 onwards, the series will be going electric only.

GCK, which most recently competed in World RX with a Renault Clio RS, sat out of this year’s championship to develop the car. In line with the regulations, it’ll produce around 680bhp and 650lb ft of instantly-delivered torque, making for 0-62mph time under two seconds.

See also: The Lancia Delta Is Coming Back As An Electric Vehicle

The thrust comes from an Austrian-made ‘Kreisel’ powertrain featuring a 52.65kWh and a motor for each axle. From the sounds of it, that stuff will be going into an original Lancia Delta chassis, although we can’t imagine much of the original car will be left over.

The power that goes into the battery pack plus the cells of all of GCK’s competitors should be nicely sustainable. Its offshoot GCK Energy will be powering the whole grid using custom-made charge ‘containers’. These draw power from solar and other renewable sources. As a proof of concept, GCK Energy has used this method to keep the RX2e support series going throughout the 2021 season.
GCK president Guerlain Chicherit had this to say about his new all-electric baby:

“I’m super excited for GCK to be returning to the FIA World Rallycross Championship under its new electric banner. The race format lends itself perfectly to delivering one of the most thrilling sporting spectacles with electric cars so far, and we chose the Lancia Delta Integrale because it is a vehicle that made us all dream. It is the rally car par excellence – without doubt the most incredible of its era – and one that remains hugely popular to this day.”