Audi R8 5.2 FSI quattro: Comparison against Auto Union D-Type Grand Prix car

Very interesting comparison here of the Audi R8 V10 against the Auto Union D-Type Grand Prix car from 1939. Enjoy!

A starter motor that sounds like it's off a vintage aircraft turns over the 3.0-liter 3-cam V-12, and the first tentative cylinder firings suggest this is a gut-powerful, low-revving engine. Yet when it clears its throat and catches, the V-12 revs with ease, a sharp-edged roar as the tach needle climbs, heavy gear whine as it falls back. If you must dim your hearing...

Then Ian McFarland climbs into the wide seat of the mid-engine machine, reattaches the steering wheel and roars off down the straightaway, headed toward what look to be vintage racetrack pits. Squint a bit and you could almost see Hermann Paul Müller rushing up that same straight on July 9, 1939, winning the French Grand Prix.

You read of how the sight and sound of the German Grand Prix cars gave pause to the English and French as war loomed ahead in 1939, and this explains it. Sure sounds like a low-flying piston fighter plane.

Related news: GermanCarBlog, P4MR, Audi R8 5.2 FSI quattro

Source: Road and Track

Audi R8 5.2 FSI quattro: Comparison against Auto Union D-Type Grand Prix car

Watch more TV. The German Car TV.

Read more