SEAT is different to most other European automakers; different in a bad way. The company we associate with the flair of Volkswagen Group was started by the Spanish government, who didn't want imports coming into the country.
As we all know, governments suck at anything that has to do with cars, so SEAT had to borrow several models from Fiat and they were average. After the deal between the companies had fallen through, SEAT began to struggle and eventually ended up knocking on Volkswagen's door.
Fast forward three generations of the Leon compact, and the Cupra is way cooler than its sister car, the GTI. When the 5F current generation was introduced a few years ago, two stages were offered, the 265 and 280. Now, we have the 290, featuring that much power from its 2-liter turbo engine.
Yet even 290 PS isn't enough for some people, the type of folks who like to go to track days or drag race their friends on Friday nights. From what we understand, the Cupra in this video started life as the 265 but has been re-mapped to produce 344 PS and 481 Nm of torque. That's about as much as the new BMW M140i.
After seeing the beloved Cupra lose a drag race to the M135i a few weeks ago, we demand a rematch. We know it will still lose, as traction is still favoring the Bimmer.
Anyway, the video we want to show you is less than a minute long and it shows what can happen when such a monster FWD car is pushed all the way to V-max. We think it was filmed on an unrestricted section of the autobahn with almost no traffic, as the high-beams are on. From 0 to 200 km/h, the tuned Cupra takes just 14 seconds. Some Leon models can't even go that high! After that comes 250 km/h or 155 km/h in 23 seconds and a leisurely stroll to 290 km/h (indicated, not real).
Does anybody know if the Cupra has a speed restrictor that was removed by the tuners or didn't get one from the factory because it wasn't supposed to be this fast? Anyway, this just shows you that with tuning, you too can overtake an M5 going all-out.
Mihnea's favorite cars have already been built, the so-called modern classics from the '80s and '90s. He also loves local car culture from all over the world, so don't be surprised to see him getting excited about weird Japanese imports, low-rider VWs out of Germany, replicas from Russia or LS swaps down in Florida. Full profile
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