Alpine has high hopes for Pikes Peak this year, where it will compete with a new variant of the A110 designed specifically for the hill climb. The Alpine A110 Pikes Peak brings revised aerodynamics, a more powerful engine, and reduced weight, in order to tackle the famous 19.93 km (12.4-mile) route in Colorado Springs, aiming to break some records.
The conversion of the A110 sportscar into a hill climb monster was undertaken by the Alpine design office in collaboration with Signatech. The extreme aero components added to the vehicle include a bulldozer-style splitter, a pronounced diffuser, and a massive rear wing that is connected to the rear window through a shark fin. All these produce maximum downforce, keeping the car glued to the ground in the 156 corners of Pikes Peak.
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The racing car also gets a bespoke set of aero-friendly wheels finished in black, a roof scoop feeding fresh air into the mid-mounted engine, and special treatment for the headlight and taillight graphics. The latter were inspired by the 24 Hours of Le Mans, featuring three vertical LED stripes on the wing. The team didn’t neglect the racing livery, combining blue, red, and white shades with stars on the roof and a Gran Turismo sticker on the windshield.
Alpine didn’t give us the detailed specifications of the upgraded powertrain but said it produces nearly 500 hp (368 kW / 507 PS). This is a significant boost over the road-going variants of the A110 which produce 297 hp (221 kW / 300 PS) from the turbocharged 1.8-liter four-cylinder engine. As a result of weight-saving measures, the A110 Pikes Peak tips the scales at 950 kg (2,094 pounds), which makes it 132 kg (291 pounds) lighter than the already lightweight production-spec A110 R.
François Letort, Alpine A110 Pikes Peak Project Manager, said: “The Alpine A110 Pikes Peak pushes the boundaries of our imagination, far beyond anything we could have envisioned in the early stages of the project,” adding that the first testing days went “really smoothly” meeting all of the initial targets.
The next step in the preparation is test runs at Lurcy-Lévis by Pikes Peak driver, Raphaël Astier, and at the Drôme and at Val Thorens, also by Astier, who was the 2022 FIA R-GT Cup winner with the A110 Rally. Finally, the one-off vehicle will fly to Colorado Springs for participating in the Time Attack 1 category of the Pikes Peak hill climb on June 25.
