Yes, this week is about F1, but Le Mans prototypes — and specifically the R18 — hold a unique place in the hearts of Audi aficionados worldwide. Maybe it’s the sheer determination and domination of Audi Sport during its endurance era, maybe it’s the lore of Le Mans, or maybe it’s the idea that a purpose-built race car could ever translate into something remotely street-able.
Of course, an LMP1 isn’t exactly street-car material. Porsche flirted with the concept this year with the 963 Hypercar, but there are deeper, more legitimate ties within the lineage of Le Mans royalty crossing over to the road. The silver Porsche 963 evoked Count Rossi’s Alabama-tagged 917 from the 1970s. Later, as the GT1 era wound down, homologation requirements demanded even more roadgoing versions. Among the most fantastical of these were the Porsche 911 GT1 (in both 996 and 993 form) and the Mercedes-Benz CLK GTR — machines that still command the imagination like few others.
It’s in that spirit that this design exercise takes shape. I’ve been toying with the idea of an R18 hypercar for the street for nearly as long as I’ve been experimenting with AI image-generation on @4Rings.AI. Somewhere on an old hard drive, there are certainly LMP1s with their decals and liveries painstakingly Photoshopped away.
This particular interpretation began as a rear-three-quarter view created in an early version of Midjourney. Its straked side venting almost recalls the tricolore Audi Sport stripes of the 1980s — not in vinyl or hand-applied paint, but sculpted directly into the bodywork. Like those rally legends, and less like a typical Le Mans prototype, I kept the car in body-in-white with white wheels. That choice loosely echoes the RS 6 GT, which itself channels the 1980s rally era and even some Cold War-era Audi production models.
With more recent AI tools, I’m able to explore the car from additional angles and with finer detail, even integrating Audi’s latest front-end design — the look introduced on the Concept C in September. Seeing that new face on the low, sweeping form of a Le Mans-inspired silhouette only makes me appreciate it more.
Now, the inevitable detail: yes, this car has an exhaust pipe. It’s imagined, so we can imagine the powertrain too. In my mind, this concept rides on something like the Lamborghini Revuelto footprint, perhaps with the high-revving V8 and electric assist from the smaller Temerario. That would give it enough differentiation within the Volkswagen Group to pass a boardroom review — and enough uniqueness for enthusiasts to see it as more than a simple reskin.
So no, it’s not an F1 car. But anything destined for the street needs fenders, and that’s where the Le Mans heritage asserts itself. It remains pure fantasy, of course — but dreaming has always been part of the Audi story.
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