By: IOL Motoring Staff
Every year Volkswagen prepares a special GTI concept for the Lake Wörthersee festival in Austria and while this year's creation is not as wild or as OTT as some of its predecessors, it is firmly planted in the real world.
VW calls it a "near-production" concept, previewing a showroom model that will become the most powerful production Golf GTI to date when it hits the streets in 2016.
While today's quickest GTI, the Performance Pack version, delivers 169kW, the Clubsport concept is good for 195kW, which places it enticingly close to the Golf R , and there's an overboost function that momentarily liberates another ten percent. Not much else is said about the motor, although it's almost certain to be a reworked version of VW's current 2-litre turbopetrol.
Built to celebrate the Golf GTI's 40th anniversary, the Clubsport also spices things up with a glut of styling mods, including a completely new front bumper, bolder side sills, large aerodynamic roof spoiler and a redesigned diffuser. VW's stylists also tinkered with the cabin, although no details or pictures have been made available as yet.
But is this new hot hatch bold enough to take the GTI badge into an exciting new future?