Audi’s quattro motorsport history is among the highlights of a new special exhibition at the Autostadt in Wolfsburg, bringing together two competition cars that helped establish all-wheel drive as a defining part of the brand.
Titled “Legends – Performance – Passion,” the exhibition is being staged at the Zeithaus, the automotive museum within Volkswagen Group’s Autostadt visitor complex. Running through the end of October 2026, it explores more than a century of motorsport history across Audi, Volkswagen, Porsche, Škoda and Ducati, with five themed areas devoted to competition, technology and their influence on the respective brands.
In Audi’s case, that story centers on quattro.
An Audi quattro rally car from the 1983 season represents the period when permanent all-wheel drive fundamentally changed the World Rally Championship. Audi had introduced quattro to the WRC only a few years earlier, demonstrating the traction advantage of driving all four wheels at a time when the concept was still unusual in high-performance passenger cars.
The displayed car comes from the 1983 season, when Hannu Mikkola secured the World Rally Championship drivers’ title for Audi. Those early rally successes did more than build Audi’s competition credentials. They helped establish quattro as one of the defining technologies and marketing pillars of the brand for the decades that followed.
Sitting alongside the rally car is another significant five-cylinder quattro competition car, though one developed for an entirely different environment.
The Audi 200 quattro Trans Am represents Audi’s 1988 assault on American road racing. Based visually on Audi’s large executive sedan, the competition version combined a turbocharged five-cylinder engine with quattro all-wheel drive at a time when neither was typical of the Trans-Am series.
Audi entered the championship with Hans-Joachim Stuck, Walter Röhrl and Hurley Haywood. The three drivers combined for eight victories during the season, helping Audi secure the manufacturers’ championship in its first year in the series.
The 200 quattro’s success also became part of a remarkable period of Audi competition in the United States. Following its Trans Am championship, Audi moved to IMSA for 1989 with the considerably more extreme 90 quattro IMSA GTO, further developing the turbocharged five-cylinder and all-wheel-drive formula.
Beyond Audi, “Legends – Performance – Passion” uses significant vehicles from across Volkswagen Group to demonstrate the connection between motorsport and production cars. The exhibition coincides with several anniversaries, including 125 years of Škoda Motorsport, 100 years of Ducati, 75 years of Porsche Motorsport and 50 years of the Volkswagen Golf GTI.
Other exhibits include a 1998 Porsche LMP1 Spyder, the experimental 2010 Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid, early and modern Ducati motorcycles, Škoda rally machinery and first- and third-generation Volkswagen Golf GTIs.
For Audi enthusiasts, however, the pairing of the 1983 quattro rally car and 1988 Audi 200 quattro Trans Am offers a particularly concentrated look at an era when motorsport wasn’t simply promoting Audi technology. It was helping define what Audi would become.
“Legends – Performance – Passion” is on display at the Zeithaus at Autostadt in Wolfsburg through the end of October 2026. The museum is open daily from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and is accessible with a valid Autostadt admission ticket.
More Information: Autostadt
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PHOTO GALLERY | photos by Tim Shulze
