Seat Isn't Happy Renault Stole Its 'Ring Record So A Hardcore Leon Cupra Is On The Way

There’s an epic front-wheel drive hot hatch battle raging at the Nurburgring. On one side there’s Renault, on the other is Seat. The pair have been competing for the FWD ‘Ring record, and neither side shows any sign of giving up.

A quick recap: back in 2008, the stripped-out Megane R26.R set an 8min 16.9sec lap time, until the Megane Trophy bettered that with an 8min 7.9sec lap in 2011. Earlier this year, Seat decided to throw its hat in the ‘Ring (sorry) with the Leon Cupra 280, undercutting the magic eight minute mark with a 7min 58.44sec lap. Not to be outdone, Renault chucked the rear seats on the side of the road and ripped out the sound insulation - ultimately shedding 100kg - and added trick suspension, giving an incredible time of 7min 54.36sec.

Some perspective? That’s about as fast as a 997 Porsche 911 Turbo. So how can the Leon possibly achieve better? Well, the Seat’s time was set in a standard Cupra (albeit with a £2500 Performance Pack that adds bigger Brembo brakes, lightweight alloys and semi-slick tyres), so with a similar crash diet to the Renault it’s perfectly reasonable to suspect it could make up the four second difference.

According to Auto Express, Seat will only re-enter this friendly competition with Renault using a car that can be purchased by customers. It’s weighing up whether anyone would be interested in such a stripped out, hardcore racer before heading back out to attempt to reclaim its title.

We’ve driven the Leon Cupra 280 in anger out on track and were absolutely blown away by its capabilities. If this pared-back racer-for-the-road enters production, we’ll be at the front of the queue. The big question is this, though: just where do we go from here? The boundaries of FWD’s capabilities are really being pushed to the extreme, and it’s a fascinating fight.