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From The Archives: Renault Gordini 1100

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Monday, February 4th, 2013 10:31 am GMT +2

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Long before Audi launched its first supercar Renault produced the R8. Performance models in the Renault Range were given the Gordini treatment. Gordinis had a giant-killing reputation as they carved up much larger, usually more powerful cars on racetracks and rally stages all over the world.

The R8 was a flyweight with the trademark white stripes over a light blue paint scheme. Uniquely it featured a rear-mounted engine location (behind the rear axle line). The inline four was longitudinally mounted. With 71 kW that helped produce a top speed of over 160 km/h the “new Gordini was the fastest production car ever to come from the Renault stable”

As the press demonstrator was not yet run-in H.J “Mossie” Mostert lent his private vehicle to CAR for the full road test treatment, which was rather gracious of him. Thanks to a high (for the era) compression ratio of 10,4:1 we had to brew up a special batch of fuel, which included aviation fuel (Avgas) to extract the best performance figures out of the little car.


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  • nigel

    Modified it was a strong performer in its day and there were some fantastic dices with other Cars, but could be beaten eg. the 1961 Kyalami 9 Hour endurance race, where an Alfa Romeo Giulietta TI, driven by Bruce Johnstone / Nick Kingwell came second to a Porsche 550 Spyder driven by Dawie Gous / John Love.

    That Alfa covered 997.455 Kilometres against the nearest Renault Gordini driven by Colin Burford / Scamp Porter in 9th place, covering 893.443 Km.

  • HJS.

    What a wonderful memory! True little legends they were! Sideways Schekter certainly made a name for himself in a Gordini, haggling the heels of Basil v Rooyen & Koos Swanepoel’s Mustangs around the old original Kyalami.

  • HJS

    thinking about the Gordini’s a bit further, I seem to recal they later became 1300′s? Would be interesting to see an article about compatrisons with today’s production 1100 or 1300′s and see just how much progress has been made with performance?

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