PoloDriver

In a story detailing Volkswagen’s plans for the Eos and other convertible models, UK auto title Car today reports that an open-air Polo is ‘still-tentative’ and could be ‘built by Karmann, starting in 2012.’ In a fresh flurry of reports, the buyout of Karmann’s facilities by VW could signal the revival of a convertible Polo. Of course, we’ve been here before, with the Polo Cabrio Concept of 2007 seen here. Actually built by Karmann as a one-off, the two-door, GTI-powered ‘study’, the Polo CC featured a soft top which included a glass sliding roof, an illuminated headliner using four small electroluminescent panels, foldable rear seats and a wide-opening boot. Could the proper open-air Polo idea be about to return?

The 2010 Sasol South African Rally Championship resumed after a six-week break in the same thrilling fashion experienced at the end of May. Staged in Port Elizabeth on 23-24 July, the Volkswagen Rally 2010 is the fifth round of the eight event championship, and saw Castrol Team Toyota’s Johnny Gemmell take the fight to VW on their home turf to win the event by just 1.5 seconds from Enzo Kuun. The second BP VW Racing Polo S2000 driven by Jan Habig finished behind Kuun in third.

Gemmell and navigator Drew Sturrock took just three special stages on day one of the event to assert their authority on the rally. The first stage was won by Conrad Rautenbach by a 12-second margin over Gemmell with the second quickest time. A win for Gemmell on the second stage saw the gap close to just 1.2 seconds with that deficit converted to a lead of 13 seconds over Habig by the end of the third stage. By the end of the first day Kuun had taken over from Habig as Gemmell’s main challenger, but was 5.3 seconds off the lead.

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The Rally of South Africa took its toll on the field of racers over the weekend of 29-30 May. Only 23 finishers crossed the line at Ermelo, with the BP Volkswagen Polo S2000 of Jan Habig and Ralph Pitchford in a hard fought second place, just 0.7 seconds behind the leaders Johnny Gemmell and Drew Sturrock and their Toyota Auris. A fantastic result considering that, at the end of the first day, the VW pair were over 1 minute and 48 seconds off the leaders and 79 seconds adrift of the eventual rally winners.

The second day proved more profitable, with the gap to the front of the pack narrowed to 46.8 seconds by the end of stage one. After six stages it was down to 38.0, and by stage eight had dropped further to 25 seconds. A further fall to 14.3 seconds had happened by the end of stage nine, while at the end of stage 10 it was up to 19.2 seconds, setting the scene for a nailbiting finish. No-one was quite sure who had actually claimed the rally victory until the cars pulled up at the podium. Analysing the list of fastest stage times, Habig and Pitchford claimed three stage wins.

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Rounds three and four of UK circuit series the Volkswagen Racing Cup were played out at Zandvoort over the weekend of 22 and 23 May. The championship’s first-ever overseas rounds, 23 racing Volkswagens of all shapes and sizes took to the Dutch seaside circuit, with two Polos mixing things up. Zoë Wenham, the Volkswagen Racing Cup’s youngest ever competitor at just 16, delivered a good account of herself on her championship debut. But, a highly unfortunate driveshaft failure – which was later followed by a problem with the turbo on her Polo GTI – meant a retirement from race one and subsequently prevented her from taking to the grid for race two.

The pair of Polos started at the back of the grid for both races, Wenham posting a 2:10.216-minute lap time equalling a 20th place on the grid, while Reigate’s Darren Blumson in the Adrenaline Motorsport Polo GTI recorded a 2:13.872, positioning him two cars further back. Zoë’s driveshaft failure meant she retired after 8 laps, while problems with Blumson’s car led him to finish only 6 laps out of the total 13. The silver Adrenaline Motorsport car started from 20th place on row 10 in race 2, but retired again, this time after 8 laps.

Similar to Blumson’s car, Wenham’s white 1.8-litre Polo GTI is also turbocharged, but prepared by KPM Racing, the team headed by ex-Honda F1 technician Kevin Poole. Speaking before Saturday’s race, Wenham said: ‘I’ve given the Polo a shakedown at Silverstone and I have a day planned at Rockingham, but other than that I have no experience of the car. It’s going to be a big step up for me.’ With extensive karting experience, Wenham has raced for two years in the junior SaxMax series, finishing the championship ninth overall in 2009. She hopes to her experience in the Volkswagen Racing Cup will enable her to graduate to touring cars.

The Volkswagen Racing Cup 2010 with Fuchs Lubricants is additionally supported by Augustus Martin, Ceva Logistics, ECM Vehicle Delivery, Hankook, Milltek Sport, KW Automotive, Superchips and Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles.

[Images: Chris Schotanus/www.imagevaults.co.uk]

The hottest factory Polo to date was the 178bhp GTI Cup Edition produced in 2006 to tie-in with the German ADAC Volkswagen Polo Cup racing series, so imagine our surprise when we saw this 485bhp monster in the May 2010 issue of Redline magazine. Yes, that’s right, a Polo GTI with 485bhp. Faster than a Mitsubishi Evo X FQ-330, Liam Burke’s tuned Polo sleeper boasts a GTI Cup Edition body kit, has 416bhp-per-tonne (203bhp-per-tonne more than the Evo) and 384lb/ft of torque. Quite an improvement on the standard GTI’s 148bhp and 384lb/ft. Available as a back issue, buy a copy of the May issue of the performance tuning title here and read more about this mental Polo.

[Images: Redline magazine]