Dr. Wolfgang Ullrich: “You should never reveal your whole game, just enough to win the races”

Dear Doctor, don’t blame me for the “Kyalami Green” color of this Audi RS3 Sedan! It was your former colleagues from Audi France who insisted, as a thank you for having been the instigator of the RS sports label within the brand with the rings!

It's true. The Competition department has always been very invested in the development of production vehicles, which were the common thread of all our activities during my period at the head of Audi Sport. In 1993, we launched the project of a four-wheel drive Super Touring (A4 quattro released in 1995. Editor's note) to prove that this architecture was useful including on the circuit, even when you have a small engine or the track is not snow-covered. (Laughs) It was a marketing path that we had already decided to take. Afterwards, it was not me who had the idea for this label, which already existed under the name “quattro GmbH”. I simply said “ yes, we, Audi Sport, are willing to participate in the development of a specially sporty range, because our name is relevant enough to do so thanks to all our racing successes ».

It was a close call for this interview to take place in a Renault, No ? Tell us about this passage in your life!

(Smile). Ah yes, it's a long story. Renault was my first real professional contact after leaving the University of Vienna, even though I was then working at Steyr-Puch in Austria. During my studies, I worked for a few months on the preparation of technical data concerning a technical complaint in Formula 1 against water injection in turbo engines. In the regulations, it was forbidden to change the gasoline or its octane number, and the complaint exploited this loophole: by injecting water into the gasoline, was this index changed? With my colleagues, we had done a lot of research, I had the right to contact all the Formula 1 teams, who had to give me all the information they had on the engines, etc. During this period, I therefore had a lot of contact with Renault which was the pioneer of this supercharged V6 technology in F1.

Who was behind this complaint?

Tyrrell, because it was the last team to run the naturally aspirated Cosworth. She understood that she no longer had any chance against the turbos...

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