Privateer Team Unveils Bespoke Audi Quattro Rally Car For The WRC

The Audi Quattro name could soon return to the World Rally Championship thanks to racing driver Mattias Ekström.

Ekström’s newly-formed EKS JC racing ream has revealed it is developing a Rally2-specification car based on the road-going Audi A1 and suitable to compete in the WRC2 and WRC3 support categories. The car has been built with the help of South African company Rally Technic.

“When the new generation of Audi A1 was launched, we knew we want to build something out of it,” Ekström said. “And since everyone knows my passion for rallying, it quickly became clear that we will build a rally car. The car is ready. It’s just the set-up work left. We need to do some test kilometers and gather the information. There is no real set date for it, but it is quite clear we will see the car in some competitions in spring/summer.”

Powering the rally car is a 1.6-liter turbocharged four-cylinder that is good for 263 hp and coupled to a five-speed sequential transmission. As you’d expect, this power is sent to all four wheels through a Quattro system.

Ekström raced an Audi S1 in the FIA World Rallycross Championship from 2014 and 2019, ultimately winning the title in 2016 and finishing runner-up in 2017 and 2018. He recently made a return to WRC at February’s Arctic Rally Finland Powered by CapitalBox and raced a Skoda Fabia in the WRC3 category.

While the car isn’t an official effort from Audi itself, it does have a white, yellow, and red livery reminiscent of the original S1 Quattro.