The star of Ken Block’s next Gymkhana video – an Audi S1 e-tron quattro electric hot hatch inspired by a Pikes Peak racer – is ready for its first public appearance.
Drift king and stunt driver Ken Block is making the switch to electric power, with an all-new hero car he is about to show in public for the first time.
Block will pull the wraps off his new drift partner — officially the Audi S1 e-tron quattro Hoonitron — at the Laguna Seca racing circuit near Monterey in California during the annual Car Week celebrations from 17-21 August.
The new Hoonitron will then star in the next instalment of his Gymkhana video series, ‘Electrikhana’, before the end of the year.
The Hoonitron e-tron is a major development for Block on many fronts, as it signals his switch from Ford to Audi — after starting his Gymkhana career with Subaru in an Impreza WRX — as well as his move to electric power.
First reported by Drive last December, the new Hoonitron is also Block’s first purpose-built drift car, starting from a specially-designed carbon fibre chassis and including two electric motors for its signature quattro all-wheel drive.
The car was designed and developed by Audi in Germany and inspired by the legendary Audi Sport Quattro S1 that conquered the Pikes Peak hillclimb in Colorado in 1987 with Walter Rohrl — now a brand ambassador for Porsche — driving.
Block test drove his new car in Germany in private before it was shipped to the USA for his Electrikhana work, but few other details have emerged.
The reveal in California during the Monterey Motorsport Reunion, one of the world’s largest annual gatherings of historic racing cars, is expected to provide the first solid information — and perhaps even the headline power figure for the car.
The e-tron Hoonitron will be joined at Laguna Seca by the original Audi Sport quattro S1, which still holds the record for the fastest time on the Pikes Peak climb — 10 minutes 48 seconds — when the event was still entirely run on a gravel surface.
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