In period, Automobile magazine contributor Georg Kacher suggested the idea for the quattro concept was first hatched as “Project Anniversario,” a birthday gift for Audi by Audi, intended for the brand’s 100th anniversary celebration in Ingolstadt in 2009. According to Kacher, the car began development in 2008 and was nearly complete for its 2009 debut when the market crashed and Audi opted to delay the reveal. Times were tough, and such a lavish gift seemed out of place, Kacher wrote in the pages of the now-defunct Automobile.
Editor’s Note: This story is Part 3 in the quattro Redux Series, or direct links to Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3..
By 2010, Audi was celebrating another milestone—30 years since the original “ur quattro” debuted in Geneva. Kacher’s report suggested the internal name changed to Project PQ3010 (project quattro 30th anniversary, out in 2010) and that the car evolved, perhaps in some design elements and in color—from Suzuka Grey to a beautiful metallic white known as Col de Turini White. The wheels also changed to the machined titanium alloys seen on the Paris show stand.
When I landed in L.A. that December and made the drive to Malibu to meet a team of Audi AG staff at a lavish home on the Pacific Coast Highway, I arrived armed with notes from Kacher’s piece. The German journalist had long been close with the Audi AG board; his sources for this story were Michael Dick (then head of development) and Wolfgang Egger (then head of Audi brand group design). When Kacher talked, I tended to listen—intently.
I used the Kacher piece as background research, running some of the more intriguing details past the Audi staff on hand—people who were certainly qualified to comment. As I usually found with stories like this, most of it was true, some of it conflicted with what I knew from my own sources, and all of it made for excellent background.
I first spoke with Wolf Seebers of Audi’s Munich design studio, the main exterior designer behind Audi’s Detroit e-tron concept. The quattro wasn’t Seebers’ design, though he was part of the project, and served as the self-admitted stand-in for the event in Malibu. He walked me through the design, emphasizing themes of high efficiency, performance, and clean, simple lines.
I’d already seen the car on several occasions, but as Seebers pointed out details of the bodywork before me, his points came into sharper focus. The car had the same presence as the Sport quattro but was far more handsome. Audi’s design team managed to capture the feel of the Sport quattro’s blistered fenders without resorting to a literal interpretation, as seen on the then-current RS 5 (B8). The Audi tornado line appeared both edgier and more voluptuous as it traced the car’s powerful shoulders.
Seebers didn’t recall the car being completed and then evolving. According to him, two main designs were considered for the quattro, both proceeding in parallel until the board chose one. Proportions were critical, and hours upon hours were spent perfecting them so the final shape felt just right.
Like the Sport quattro on which it was spiritually based, the quattro concept had a wheelbase 5.9 inches shorter than the RS 5 from which it was loosely derived. The rear overhang was shortened by 7.9 inches. Unlike the Sport quattro—which gained height to reduce glare for rally drivers—the concept sat 1.6 inches lower than the production RS 5.
The design also paid homage to the original with its rectangular taillights and unmistakable straight, angled C-pillar, though it was anything but retro. The square-ish taillights may have evoked the 1980s in shape, but their sculpted, integrated design made contemporary production taillights look dated. Audi also skipped the original’s short trunk in favor of a more practical hatchback.
The headlights, too, fused modern Audi design with early quattro heritage. While the original cars used four square sealed-beam units, the concept embraced a new lighting technology just coming online—LED arrays. Each headlight featured quad rotating LED modules that integrated turn signals and other functions behind two sleek, stylized housings.
After speaking with Seebers, I met Peter Seizinger from quattro GmbH, who told me the car had previously been painted Misano Red—though he much preferred the current shade. Seizinger, a Technical Project Coordinator at quattro GmbH, was an intriguing figure. This was the man who had made the V10 biturbo fit in the C6 RS 6, and he had managed the quattro concept project from the very beginning. At the time, he hoped to stay on if the project was greenlit for production.
Seizinger explained that this concept differed from previous Audi efforts in several ways. On the technical side, it began with the engine fitment. Back in Neckarsulm, Seizinger’s team installed the five-cylinder TT RS engine into what was described as an RS 5 chassis, though I would later learn it was the lightweight A5 prototype known internally as “The Beast.”
Installation was a major challenge, as the five-cylinder turbo was both longer and taller than even Audi’s V10. To make it fit, the team fabricated a modified intake manifold, providing clearance beneath the vented carbon-fiber hood. The Audi staff in Malibu were happy to let me inspect their work, though the unfinished manifold wasn’t ready for photographs.
Aside from the intake manifold, little else had been altered on the production 2.5T FSI. A freer-flowing exhaust and recalibrated ECU raised output to a reported 402 bhp (5,400–6,500 rpm) and 354 lb-ft of torque (1,600–5,300 rpm), compared with the stock TT RS’s 340 bhp and 332 lb-ft.
To keep things pure—and the weight down—the team paired the five-cylinder with a six-speed manual sourced from the S5. After all, the first-generation RS 5 had been S tronic–only.
Fitting the engine to the RS 5 chassis was only the beginning, and more of a fitment guide than a production blueprint. Once installed, the project was shipped off to Italdesign in Turin, Italy. While the quattro concept was designed in-house at Audi’s Munich studio, Giorgetto Giugiaro’s Italdesign—later acquired by Audi—had a long history of producing concept cars for the Volkswagen Group and was tasked with building the prototype.
One of the key goals was to match the original Sport quattro’s weight of just 2,900 lbs—no small feat when that 1980s rally icon had already pushed the limits of lightweight construction. The 1984 Sport quattro used carbon body panels and even a pioneering aluminum engine block. To reach that magic number, Audi employed an aluminum ASF (Audi Space Frame) similar to the A8’s, while Italdesign fashioned nearly every non-drivetrain or interior component from carbon fiber.
The RS 5 used a steel frame, but Audi’s advances with its modular longitudinal platform (MLB) and ASF experience made the transition feasible.
By that point, I hadn’t yet driven “The Beast” test mule with its 2.5 TFSI installed. However, I had sampled the 2.0 TFSI version at a lightweight tech day earlier that year. I mentioned it to Seizinger and asked if that aluminum A5 project had aided in developing the quattro concept. With a knowing smile, he confirmed it had—but offered little more. Given Audi had already developed an “ASF prototype” of the B8 coupe, its use of aluminum for the quattro concept—and potential production—made perfect sense.
When the final quattro concept returned to Ingolstadt from Turin, Audi had achieved its goal. Weighing in at 2,900 lbs, the car matched the mass of the original Sport quattro—a remarkable accomplishment given the added electronics and safety equipment required for a modern Audi in 2010.
With 402 hp, the car’s power-to-weight ratio rivaled that of the R8 GT, itself capable of lapping the Nürburgring in just seven minutes and 33 seconds. In fact, the quattro concept was lighter than both the R8 GT and that year’s Porsche 911 GT3 RS.
That brings us back to Malibu, where the quattro concept sat ready to drive—not just as a static design study, but as a living, breathing machine that aimed to bridge past and future. In the next installment, I’ll revisit that day behind the wheel: the driving impressions, the sound and the surreal experience of sampling one of the most captivating concept cars Audi has ever built. Stay tuned.
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