Single-Seater Rallycross Is A Motorsport That Needs To Happen
Later this month, the Nurburgring will be hosting its first-ever FIA World Rallycross Championship round. To plug this momentous event, someone in the marketing department had a great, attention-grabbing idea - to send a single-seater formula car around the track set to be used for the race.
Chief ‘Ring instructor Andreas Gülden was strapped into the Hightech formula machine, which produces a modest 140bhp from a 1.2-litre inline-four, but is plenty fast thanks to a pithy weight figure of just 455kg. With bigger wheels and treaded tyres fitted (we can’t imagine it’d get far on slicks), the single-seater coped amazingly well with the bumpy gravel course.
It looked like Gülden was having bags of fun with frequent gravelly powerslides, and thankfully, we get a full onboard video to go with the slickly edited advert-y stuff.
See also: Retracing The Nurburgring Sudschleife - The Nordschleife’s Even Scarier Brother
The track, finished in 2020, is just over 1,000 metres long and is located in the Mullenbachsleife area of the Nurburgring Grand Prix circuit. It incorporates turn six of the ‘GP-Strecke’ as the start line, but in reverse compared to the track’s usual flow.
Our main takeaway from this? As impressive as the current (and soon-to-be-replaced) World RX cars are, developing around 600bhp and hitting 0-62mph in just 1.9 seconds, we’re now busying thinking how awesome a single-seater rallycross series might be. It’s entertaining enough watching one formula car having a little play, so just imagine 10 or so of the things sliding around and jostling for position.
Any promoters out there fancy making this a reality?
Growing up on a diet of World Rally Championship highlights and lengthy Gran Turismo 2 sessions, a life in cars was as good as inevitable for Matt.
Comments
offroad single seaters are well represented by sprint midget cars which raced on the States. I think people used to run MR single-seaters on Pikes Peak HC when it was still on dirt, which was like craziest thing. But this is just another world of crazy.
Imagine a field of F1 cars on a dirt track!