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The new Golf 8.5 GTI Edition 50 is the fastest VW yet.
The green hell has seen its fair share of celebrations recently, and the latest brand to pop a champagne cork at the famous 20.8km stretch of tar is Volkswagen. With the recent arrival of the 8.5 Golf in South Africa, we are eagerly awaiting the arrival of the GTI variant. However, few people are aware that this year marks 50 years since the introduction of the first Golf GTI, and the brand's celebratory model, the 8.5 GTI Edition 50, is a serious force to be reckoned with.
With the 24 Hours of Le Mans fast approaching, Volkswagen is set to reveal its Edition 50 GTI, and it already has an impressive notch on its belt. Its new achievement now crowns it as the fastest road-legal, production Volkswagen around the Nürburgring with a time of 07:46.13 minutes with the company’s test driver, Benny Leuchter, behind the wheel.
Benny Leuchter is a racing driver with an impressive legacy at VW and its Nürburgring escapades. He first set the brand's fastest lap in 2016 in the GTI Clubsport S with a time of 07:49.21 minutes, which he later broke in 2022 with the Golf R 20 Years with a time of 07:47.31. Now he has returned and dethroned the Golf R 20 Years as the fastest VW around the ring with a GTI, and it couldn’t have come at a better time.
This particular GTI is no normal Golf. It is the most powerful production GTI to date, and to start, it produces 193kW compared to the standard 180kW, which is all sent to the front wheels. But it appears that the magic is in the handling. Volkswagen has yet to release a deep dive on this car's engineering, which will likely come with its unveiling this week at Le Mans. But in order to outperform the Golf R, there has to be a trick in this car, which comes in the form of bespoke semi-slick Bridgestone Potenza tyres.
What we do know is that Volkswagen claims that the Golf 8.5 GTI Edition 50 is one of the world's most agile FWD cars, and the Edition 50 does come with an optional Performance Package that includes a performance chassis, aero kit, and the aforementioned lightweight 19-inch semi-slick race tyres. So that’s likely why this car is so fast and is a touch overkill for a production hot hatch.
It's an impressive feat from Volkswagen; however, it's yet to beat the Civic Type R around the Nordschleife for the FWD production record. Much like the Type-R record, this car isn’t completely stock and has been called a near-production test vehicle. Nevertheless, this could mean that the normal Golf 8.5 GTI is more exciting and hopefully less boringly clinical than the outgoing model, which is exactly what that car needs.
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