2015 Acura TLX Makes Competition Debut at Mid-Ohio

The 2015 Acura TLX sports sedan made its debut earlier this year at the North American International Auto Show (NAIAS) that Chris and I attended. Weirdly, despite tweeting about it frantically and taking a few pictures of the car’s advanced engine, we didn’t write an article about it then. Consider the car you see here, then – the 2015 Acura TLX GT race car – a lesson in taking Acura seriously.

Set to debut at this weekend’s Mid-Ohio World Challenge GT race, a support race for the IndyCar “main event”, the 2015 Acura TLX GT will compete in the top category of the Pirelli World Challenge, facing competition from the like of the Audi R8, Bentley Continental Supersport, Dodge/SRT Viper, Ferrari 458 Italia, McLaren’s MP4/12C GT, and the Porsche 911 GT3 RSR.

Serious machinery, in other words.

RealTime Racing owner/driver Peter Cunningham will be behind the wheel of the new Acura, and hopes the flexible engine and willing chassis will help him overcome his more powerful competitors. “The Pirelli World Challenge has a lot of strong competitors in GT, but the TLX is the only all-wheel-drive car in the category. For our four-door sedan to be racing head-to-head with the likes of Ferrari and Lamborghini … is pretty cool,” he said.

Developed from the production Acura TLX by HPD and RealTime Racing, the Acura TLX GT features an HPD-modified chassis, Honda’s Super-Handling (SH) all-wheel drive system, and aerodynamic performance parts approved for Pirelli World Challenge competition, and is powered by a direct-injected, twin-turbocharged V6 engine similar to the one used by Honda in the IMSA DP category.

“We’re excited to debut the Acura TLX GT race car in front of our ‘hometown’ audience of associates from the many Honda facilities in central Ohio,” said Art St. Cyr, President of Honda Performance Development and Vice President of Auto Operations for American Honda. “The competition in the Pirelli World Challenge is fierce … (but) Acura has never shied away from a challenge. Instead, we seek it out, both on-track and in the marketplace.”

Big words from everyone. Here’s hoping the Honda guys and the RealTime Racing 2015 Acura TLX GT can deliver!

Source | Photos: Honda.

Audi A8 E-Tron Will Use TDI Engine

 

A report in Auto Express says that the upcoming Audi A8 e-tron will use it’s all new 3.0 liter TDI engine to power the plug-in hybrid.This may give Audi an efficiency edge on its PHEV competitors, cars like the Mercedes S Class HYBRID and the BMW ActiveHybrid 7 Series plug-in, both of which will employ a gasoline engine instead. The Audi TDI package should beat the 100 grams of CO2 per kilometer target so important to European buyers, and deliver a ton of torque as well.  Dr. Ulrich Hackenberg, Audi’s head of technical development, said that:

The 3.0-litre e-Tron will be used in different cars. The plug-in hybrid is an exciting combination.

The V6 TDI system will likely find its way into the rest of Audi’s larger automobiles like the Q7 and A6 as the company continues its push to offer a PHEV version of every model it sells. Well, almost. The Audi R8 e-tron won’t be offered as a hybrid, but will instead offer an all electric option on special order only. Audi will use a 1.4 liter gasoline engine hybrid in its smaller cars like the A3 e-tron, scheduled for sale in 2015.

The TDI hybrid will be good for 368 hp and 515 lb-ft of torque, and will have an electric-only range of 30 miles or more, joining its smaller sibling, the Audi A6 e-tron, which will go on sale in China first. Fuel economy figures weren’t discussed, but with more than 500 ft-lbs of torque on tap, I’d be happy with anything over 25 MPG.

Source: Gas2