Volkswagen - Motorsport

Motorsport

• In 1963, Formula Vee circuit racing, with cars built from easily available Beetle parts, started in the United States. It quickly spread to Europe and other parts of the world. It proved very popular as a low-cost route into formula racing.
• In 1971, Volkswagen of America started the more powerful Formula Super Vee, which became famous for hothousing new talent. In the 11 years it ran, until 1982, it produced a stable of world-famous Formula One drivers—names like Niki Lauda, Jochen Mass, Nelson Piquet, Jochen Rindt and Keke Rosberg. Volkswagen also notched up several victories, and the championship in Formula Three.
• In 1976, Volkswagen entered the under-2000-cc Trans-Am Series, with the Scirocco, and they won their class outright.
• In 1981, now based in Hanover, and renamed Volkswagen Motorsport, VW took a new direction into rallying, with the launch of the first-generation Golf, and Sweden's Per Eklund, Frenchman Jean-Luc Thérier, and the Finn Pentti Airikkala. The final chapters in Volkswagen Racing UK's rallying story were the 'one-make' Castrol Polo Challenge, and the Polo GTI 'Super 1600' in 2001.
• In 2000, Volkswagen started a one-make racing cup with the newly released to Europe New Beetle called the ADAC New Beetle Cup. Beside that, the ADAC Volkswagen Lupo Cup, founded in 1998, is continued to support young talents on the way to the top.
• In 2001, the department was renamed Volkswagen Racing, and since then has concentrated all its efforts on developing its circuit racing championship, the Volkswagen Racing Cup.
• In 2003, VW replaced the ADAC Volkswagen Lupo Cup with the newly released Polo, to become the ADAC Volkswagen Polo Cup.
• In 2004, Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles entered the European Truck Racing series with the Volkswagen Titan series truck – it became back-to-back champions for the 2004 and 2005 series.
• In 2011 Volkswagen Motorsport entered two Skoda Fabia S2000s into the World Rally Championship for round 8 in Finland. The drivers were Andreas Mikkelsen and Joonas Lindroos. They plan on entering a full WRC campaign in 2013 with the Polo-R WRC.
• In 2018, Volkswagen is considering a move in to Formula One according to VW's head of motorsport.