Celebrating 20 years of Skoda vRS
Some of the Czech brand’s famous fast cars sampled
WHEN you’re a well established car brand, you need a performance vehicle to act as that allimportant ‘halo’ model to grab people’s attention and drag them into the dealership. Even Skoda, perhaps the most sensible of them all, observed this unwritten rule when it launched the vRS line-up back in 2001.
Attaching the Victory Rally Sport moniker to a Skoda might have raised eyebrows then, but vRS models have garnered a serious following over the past 20 years. There’s genuine motorsport heritage behind the name, and today one in five new Skodas wears the badge.
Skoda entered rallying in the sixties, building on a series of cars competing at a national level. The Skoda 130 RS took a class win at the 1977 Monte Carlo Rally, and since the introduction of vRS, Skoda has been an regular force in rallies across the globe.
In 2011, Skoda built a 700bhp Octavia to race at the legendary Bonneville Speed Week in Utah, US, making headlines around the world. A regular production model was stripped and rebuilt by a small team of Skoda UK technicians. Despite looking nigh-on identical to a standard car, it hit a record-breaking 227mph.
Sampling this unique car from the driver’s seat, is a raw, deafening experience. There’s precious little performance initially, but once the rev counter passes 5,000rpm all hell breaks loose. It feels more like a fullfat GT racer than a sensible hatchback. We don’t go near its 200mph-plus top speed, but I’ve new-found respect for those drivers who have taken it there.
It’s a thrilling model from vRS history, which on the way has tracked industry trends through petrol and diesel power to electricification. We joined Skoda to sample its highlights from the past two decades.