Every manufacturer has a cool prototype, race machine and sometimes even production vehicles that make me think twice about switching sides. VW is no different. I have a list of VW’s I would seriously consider trading my wife in on haha(hope she doesn’t see this).
For me it happens to be an auto that unfortunately never made it’s way to the U.S. during it’s campaign. It began in the late 80′s. Carrying itself on wider box flared panels, G60 powerplant and double the price of your standard GTI made this car a monster in it’s day. It’s not the Corrado(iconic on it’s own terms) it’s the Golf Rallye. I remember the first time I saw one in person. It was the NGP car back in like 2002 while the founding members of LOA were on a cross country trek to Waterfest for a weekend filled full of madness and a wooden cut out of Dorthy from the “Wizard of Oz”(don’t ask). We cruised partially through the mountains with this built green monster until a breaking point came and it smashed down the loud pedal and pulled away like I had just pulled the E-brake and downshifted to 1st at highway speeds. I had only seen pictures of such a machine until that point; it was truly amazing. Since then I have seen the car multiple times along with a very small handful of other Rallye’s. ICONIC is all I can say and I drool every time I see one.
It was an era where the engineers and manufactures were competing against not only function and design, but each other. So many amazing European cars were unleashed in the late 80′s(190e 2.3, E30 M3, Ford Sierra RS, etc…) It was an era that pushed envelopes of function and design; many auto manufacturers were extremely successful, others failed miserably with their releases(Nissan S12). The “Rallye” is a car I can see my self cruising in 20 years from now. The harsh realities of it keep me from making a move on one though.
On to some pics of my favorites.
