Volkswagen considering Taigun one-make championship to replace Polo National Racing Championship

It's been a long, and momentous, run for the Volkswagen Polo in the Indian market, as well as the Indian motorsport scene with a domineering presence in road racing, as well as rally championships, over the last decade. But with the production of the VW Polo officially coming to a halt 12 long years after its introduction to the country, it's time to pass on the baton, at least where Volkswagen Motorsports' road racing endeavours are concerned. We've been told that the company is considering replacing its VW Polo National Racing Championship cars (previously known as the Polo Cup cars) with race-prepared VW Taigun SUVs for the 2022 season of racing. 

Whilst no details have been confirmed, apart from the fact that the VW Taigun as used for the single-make championship will race on 17-inch MRF slicks, as used previously on the Volkswagen Motorsport Polo, Vento and Ameo Cup cars, we do have prior knowledge of the 1.0 TSI engine being used in development for motorsport use in various formats. In fact, we've been invited to sample the Volkswagen Taigun 1.0 TSI in both 6-speed manual and automatic variants (fully stock cars currently used as Medical/Safety cars) shod with slicks at the Madras Motor Race Track (MMRT), Chennai. 

We're told that the Taigun race series may run with stock engines to begin with, with more power being added later via higher-output engine tunes, which we know have already been tried and tested. There's also the possibility of the 1.5 TSI evo engine making an appearance in the championship, it's early days yet. Though, typically, the Volkswagen Motorsport racing championship kicks off early in the year, the pandemic has thrown regular scheduling out the window, with the 2021 season having started only in October last year, after having spent an entire season in 2020 with virtual races. 

Given that the Volkswagen Virtus sedan, a very likely candidate to go racing, has only just seen its global reveal, with a launch scheduled for May 2022, and will thus not be ready in time for the 2022 season, we can look forward to seeing a fully-developed VW Virtus racecar for the 2023/24 season. Whether Volkswagen Motorsport sees fit to fully develop the VW Taigun in the meantime (minimum safety requirements mandate a full roll cage, and slicks will perform best with track-spec coilovers all of which could require significant re-engineering to make the cars competitive) remains to be seen. We're told, at this point, we could see the Taigun developed for both road racing, as well as rally racing - we especially have our fingers crossed for the latter.

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